Life on the Offbeat
by Re-Ane
Summary: Set postLightspeed, focusing on Jinx and Kid Flash. Chapter ten: It's official. The world has ended. We have update.
1. Some Absurd Color

A/N: Oh yes. After ages of devouring RK fanfiction, I've published a fic, and it's a TT one. Wtf. Wtf indeed. Anyways, yes, focused around Kid Flash and Jinx, it is winter, four days after Lightspeed and still in Jump City,riddled with plot holes already, I will solve the more gaping ones (besides the season- winter it is, regardless of all logic) when I have a chance to talk about them. Will do best to keep characters IC, haven't read the comics but will do a bit of research within reason (and listen to suggestions from the knowledgeable) and will address the non-addressed issue of secret identities/school and such (which in the animated series is basically "What secret identities?"), will address the issue of Jinx NOT just automatically going goodie in a heartbeat because OMG dashing Kid Flash and NOT just having no attachment to the rest of the HIVE five, will address Titans Together, am filled with much thanks to Ri-Ri for beta help and making me work. There, I think I've covered everything I want to for now. Onward!

Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Titans or the characters, or really anything I mention off-hand that's already owned here. Of course I could still be sued, but last I checked, swearing, rude gestures and small carved gnomes don't pay off debts. That's all you'll get from me, really not worth the effort.

* * *

The air in Jump City would be fine, Jinx reflected, if it wasn't for this damn _wind._

And she'd know, considering that she'd been dealing with it nearly nonstop for the last four days. Nonstop nearly her whole _life_, come to think of it. Cold and biting, it swirled around her in snowy eddies, clawed at the edges of her outfit, froze the ends of her hair, and it was being a general pain in the-

"Oh, I'm sorry," murmured a passing businesswoman who had bumped shoulders with her. It was mechanical and thrown over the woman's shoulder as she hurried away. Jinx didn't blame her and wondered at the fact that she'd apologized at all. People in the city didn't exactly stop to say hello, especially when the sun was quickly disappearing behind the sharp outline of skyscrapers, and the only source of light was swiftly becoming the cold glow of liquor stores that stayed open late and the lifeless, flickering luminescence of the streetlamps that seemed to leech her surroundings of their color.

It was this dreary, dangerous city night mood that forced Jinx to quicken her pace and walk with her shoulders rolled back, her odd slit eyes and the reputation she'd gained warning away any of the low-life muggers that were looking for a nice vulnerable victim with wide eyes and a fat wallet. One of her hands fisted on the strap of the messenger bag, filled with the few basic necessities she cared about enough to keep, swinging at her side. Even though she'd very much like to clutch her rather inadequate attire to her chest and hunch her shoulders to contain what warmth she had left, she couldn't. And besides… She might crush the stupid rose.

Oh well, huddling against the cold was an effort in futility; anyways-She'd already gotten snow in her boots. How had she managed to get snow in her boots? They were quite high, warm boots, normally. Comfy, even. She hadn't tripped over anything as she was prone to doing when she didn't keep her eyes on the bad luck at her fingertips. And yet, there was snow. In her boots. There was not supposed to be snow in her boots because snow was cold and not at all fun to have in one's boots. As Jinx tried to distract herself from this frustrating train of thought, an even bigger one was taunting her from the corner of her eye, red and beautiful and demanding her attention.

Which brought her back to the whole reason she had disappeared, without fanfare, down a dark alley filled with dirty trashcans and the echoing of her footsteps. The reason she'd finally left the HIVE five to fend for themselves. The reason why she was cold and suppressing her shivers while walking down the streets of Jump City with _snow in her boots, agh! _Cold. Damn cold. Damn boots. Damn snow. Damn Kid Flash and his damn stalker roses.

Of course, it wasn't the roses that were stalking her, but the idiot who was leaving them. When she'd first left she hadn't expected to see another _hint_ of the fiery-headed twit. Which, she had not thought at all or in any way, was a shame, since she knew the rose would probably meet some sort of unfortunate end, if _she_ was carrying it around. But the second it had started to wilt she had found another one on a snowy park bench with a ridiculous smiley face drawn into the snow like the stupid speedster just couldn't resist (Kid Flash, in fact, couldn't. He'd sensed that she needed thinking time, but couldn't help keeping an eye on her and leaving her roses on park benches. And the white snow, it had _called_ to him!). And another one the next day, tied to a tree of all things (He nearly impaled himself on a fire hydrant after he slipped on an icy patch of tree bark). She'd have liked to see him attempt to set _that_ up. Not that she wanted to see him, or anything. At all. Nope. Well, to be honest, maybe a bit, if only to mock him. But, as with many other things she'd like to do, she couldn't.

What she needed was time to wander and think, and then to organize her thoughts and re-organize them, and re-file them and skim through them again and alphabetize them, and hope that she got something out of the mess. She'd never had to do much soul-searching before this, so she didn't blame herself much for having a bit of trouble. After all, her life had always been straightforward, if not always enjoyable. Earn respect, get to the top, push a few people down and climb over them if necessary. But then that speedster had just raced in and prodded at her motives and questioned her position and alternatively put her at ease and made her stand on edge with his jokes and his words and his roses, and now nothing was certain anymore (save the fact that Jump City was cold at night- that much she'd figured out). So she walked and pondered.

Heroism. If she became a hero, what would that make her? _A villain turned hero, stupid, _muttered a resentful little voice in the back of her head. It was the same voice of reason that told her not to over-think things, but she couldn't help it. This was the reason why she had trouble with true/false answers, darn it! The world was not just true or false, even if everyone else (or at least her old teachers back at the HIVE academy) thought it was. Kid Flash certainly seemed to. She wouldn't be surprised if he saw everything in black and white, like a dog. She snorted softly to herself. He certainly looked like one, with those big, blue eyes and that beseeching stare- Okay, Jinx, we're trying to NOT think about him, 'kay now? But she was in a gray area right now, and in a second she was going to end up in some absurd color, like purple. She was asking for it, anyways, seeing as she was going to his place of dwelling now.

She didn't really care at the moment, though. It was cold and Kid Flash was out helping the city- She knew, she'd heard it on a radio in a storefront. It irked her how easily his name caught her attention, but right now she was more irked by the wind. A warm place to stay was always welcome (it was better than sleeping in drafty semi-abandoned warehouses), and he'd left her the address with that last rose, hadn't he? So she'd just break in and savor his surprise when he walked in to discover her lounging on his couch or raiding his fridge. For once she'd be able to sit back and be the blasé one while he stuttered and wondered at the fact that she'd suddenly showed up at his apartment.

Even though most of her thoughts were about how important it was to get _away_ from him, she figured he'd be out most of the time doing his do-gooder thing. The rare glimpse of him wouldn't affect her, right? She hoped so. He had set off her bout of walking and thinking, but she didn't want him to be the reason she became a hero, if she even tried. After all, if all it took to make her convert sides was the odd good-looking (not that Jinx thought Kid Flash was good-looking. At all. Of course not, that's absurd…) male to saunter up and offer a few words, how dedicated was she, really? Although she was a villain, she'd always prided herself on being extremely loyal if she found anyone worthy of her loyalty, (which, obviously, she hadn't… trusting people wasn't so easy with her lifestyle and just look at the kind of disappointment Madam Rouge turned out to be…) and being a girl of action who was dedicated to her cause, and who wouldn't be swayed by petty things. Hypothetically, if she were to dedicate herself to the do-gooder cause… how pure would her motives be? _Could_ she really dedicate herself to such a thing? (Argh, that was such a do-gooder concern, darn it!) If she tried the whole hero gig because of shallow reasons, wouldn't she be just as easily swayed back to her life of petty robberies and dreams of making it big?

Well, hopefully she wouldn't have to worry about that. Kid Flash had certainly been the reason she'd turned around and started wandering in the opposite direction, but she was pretty sure that there had always been something there that wasn't all that enamored with villainy. Respect, yes. Action, yes. But not villainy in particular. Not lately, at least… The rush she felt was fading, had been fading from the lack of skill it took to commit the average petty crime. Stress, the desire to attempt something bigger and get her teammates to comply had wound her up tightly, made her retreat even further from what she enjoyed until even the dense HIVE five was making remarks regarding how she never had any fun anymore. These remarks usually escalated fights in which she'd get more and more frustrated: THEY were the ones who ONLY cared about mucking about and were content with those pathetic things that could barely be called crimes. It wasn't about just freedom anymore, about knowing and reaching for what she wanted. She was aiming for the biggest goal she had, now- all the little wants had to be ignored or she'd never get anywhere. No, what started out as a rush became a means to an end. Her art was reduced to a crude way to live.

But… what if she wasn't that enamored with heroism, either? She certainly wasn't enamored with that speedy moron. He was just a pain who happened to have an apartment she was going to stay at. Who just happened to show her another path to contrast with the one she'd always known. So. The paths were there. Now all she had to do was stop walking around in circles in the snow and choose one.

…Or maybe she'd just think about it more over some hot cocoa in a nice, warm apartment. Or, you know, not do the whole making-hard-decisions thing. Maybe she'd watch TV. Yes, that sounded nice. After all, she had already reached his apartment complex, and the snow in her boots was melting.

Due to her purposeful stride, one that she'd perfected and used to get into many places where she wasn't supposed to be, she simply walked right in, thanking the nice-looking young gentleman who held the door open for her. Immediately she broke into a fit of furious silent swears. She wasn't supposed to thank people while she was in a gray area, darn it…! Or was she? Ahh, she needed cocoa and mind-numbing TV.

She'd already memorized his apartment number, and chose the stairs over the elevator. She was exhausted, but not enough to risk being kicked out by riding in an elevator with someone who wouldn't recognize her, except maybe as a villainess, which would be disastrous. When Jinx finally reached his door, she shot a small burst of pink energy at the lock.

"Oops… Faulty lock, Kid Flash, what bad luck. Tsk tsk…" she said to herself, chuckling. Walking in and locking the door behind her, she surveyed the place… Not bad. It was moderately spacious with a nice living room (complete with a nice TV, her mind added), a small kitchen that connected to the living room with a little dining-room-ish area in between, a bathroom (complete with tub, her mind added, growing happier by the second), and what she assumed was Kid Flash's bedroom. The place wasn't immaculate- after all, a guy lived here- but it was her kind of messy, not a HIVE five bathroom disgusting kind of messy. It was… Inviting? Lived-in. Homey. Oh, yes, this would certainly do- just for a temporary stay, of course, she thought contentedly. _Now, for that hot cocoa…_

* * *

And now a word from our sponsor- I mean editor. Read it. Read it, or I will cut you. (Just joking, of course, valued reader. –hugs, while placing a tracer-) ;) Also, read and review her stories (search for Under the Influence under Rurouni Kenshin). RK goodness. She will flip out and I get to hear a HappyOMGGotAReview!Ri-Ri for a while instead of a SurlyDangerousLethal!Ri-Ri. ;D 

E/N - Whoo! My turn to corrupt Re-Ane's fics. (shiftyeyes) Shhhh… This is Re-Ane's first fic. Y'hear me? FIRST. And even though I hardly got any reviews on my first fic (shameless plug), I expect at least 3 here, got it? Though Re-Ane didn't use my suggestion for the name of the hedgehog (Mildred) (A/N: Just relax readers, you'll know soon enough), I will still be a loyal friend and bug all of you, the readers, to do your civic duty and review. Reviewing it preferable to jury duty, right? It's quick, painless, and can be submitted anonymously so nobody knows who you are. If all you're doing it writing two little words and in return you get a chapter update, in the end, aren't you getting the better end of the deal?

End A/N (Yes I get another one for I am the author bwa ha ha ha): Alright, I'm going to try to keep this on a weekly update schedule. Any sooner and I wouldn't meet the deadline, become discouraged and go into hiding as a monk in Tibet. Next chapter includes children's television, various girly bath products, and angry pajamas, not necessarily in that order. Beware.

Also, regarding reviews. It's okay. I'm not going to try to get you to review. We all know it's "just two buttons." I'm lazy and don't review sometimes (especially when anonymous reviews are disabled- I'm too lazy to log in), too. Oh, I am a sinner. But I shall not be a hypocrite. I do not expect reviews- if you decide to leave a review I commend you for your valiant effort. Really, obviously Ri-Ri cares about this more than I do- Review hers. And, until next time, Ciao readers!


	2. Here's the male he never fails

**A/N**: Well, I said I was going to wait a week to update, but you guys were all so good about reviewing that I'm just putting this up here as fast as I finished it. Seriously, I was like "Psh, reviews… Like that's going to happen." And then, shortly afterwards, I was like, "Omg, reviews. o.0" Also, many thanks goes to Natarie, my uber-spiffy-beta-ninja, who stayed up and got neck pains with me so I could get it posted.

Unnecessary amounts of silliness abound in this chapter, my apologies. It's mostly due to sugar and the things that people do when no one's watching, and the fact that one of the things I like best about Jinx and Kid Flash is their banter. Also- I bet Darth Vader dances to the Milkshake song when no one is looking. You know you do it too. ;)

Finally (I know people skim over the A/Ns anyway, but I'm going to blather on anyways dammit), obviously from the detail in this chapter, I am guilty of having watched Blue's Clues. Hee hee. If you haven't watched that show and helped Steve out, you have no soul. Seriously. I have no soul and I sing the mail song. You just have no choice.

And on the note of children's television, Arthur is good too. A-a-r-d-v-a-r-k!

Onward!

* * *

"Bath and Body Works, Sunflower-Daisy Meadow Fragrance? What the hell!" Jinx stared down at the bottle in her hand incredulously. Even with the sweet siren call of hot chocolate beckoning her from the kitchen, she was cold and had decided to wait until she had a decent shower first. Investigation of the bathroom revealed that it was acceptably clean, and investigation of the closet led to a bin shoved towards the back with… these. All the nice-smelling, girly things that she normally scoffed at (she'd only go with the lightest of fragrances or suffer the taunts and complaints of her teammates, not to mention that the majority of them annoyed her with their cutesy names and overbearing, sickly scent) were all conveniently gathered in Kid Flash's closet.

_Is there something he isn't telling me?_ Jinx wondered with an amused snort. She paused and sniffed at the air- Nope, it didn't seem like he _used_ them, the bathroom smelled… vaguely reminiscent of Kid Flash himself as was to be expected: dark but not harshly so, warm, masculine and actually kind of ni- Banishing such errant thoughts by sniffing and gagging at an overly pink bottle complete with bow labeled "Happy Fluffy Cotton Candy Dreams," Jinx felt herself tense up again. _Stupid apartment. Stupid bathroom. Trying to catch me off my guard. I'm on to you!_

Her voice echoed back at her and she jumped. Oops- guess she'd said that last thing out loud… Feeling rather silly but still sore at this obviously malevolent place of dwelling, she opted for a quick shower instead of the warm, luxurious bath her body was clamoring for. Steam coiled out of the bathroom as she stepped back into the living room, a hand clutched protectively around her towel. She cast a quick glance to make sure the curtains were pulled over the window- they were- before grabbing her messenger bag and retreating back into the bathroom.

At first, in her good mood she'd envisioned long baths and uber-comfy clothes to sleep in, but she hadn't really factored in the fact that this was most certainly _not_ her apartment. She was staying at that idiot speedster's place, yeah, but there was no way she was just going to lounge around in whatever, being all un-threatening and such. That just… No, darn it. She wouldn't try to attack him but she refused to let him think she was just a harmless little dove. After all, she wasn't a hero. Not exactly. Not a villain either, though…

Well, the point was that she most certainly couldn't let her guard down. The treacherous bathroom had reminded her of that. _Damn bathroom and its… its… nice (NOT nice, NOT nice) smelling… ness! _At a loss of good accusations (To her defense, it _was_ getting late…) her mind promptly lapsed into incoherent angry swears as she styled her hair up again and pulled on the darkest, angriest pajamas in her possession. And Jinx had quite a collection of dark, angry pajamas! The apartment would surely fall at her feet, not to mention that speedster idiot. With a malevolent chuckle at her obviously brilliant act of rebellion, Jinx scuttled off to raid Kid Flash's kitchen.

About seven and a half hours, three cups of cocoa, two bags of gummy bears and a Snickers bar later, and Jinx, despite her declaration of war against the apartment, was very much relaxed. She had discovered how to pull the couch out into a bed and was currently rather silly from lack of sleep. She wasn't going to fall asleep until she knew that Kid Flash was in his room or something, and not about to walk in on her while she slept. That would kind of ruin the whole dramatic "Ahh, girl stealing my apartment I am ruined, _ruined!_" scene she was aiming for (This hadn't been her original ideal reaction, but it was probably the sugar talking by this point anyways). The fact that she was watching early-morning children's television wasn't helping…

Guiltily, she looked back at the door and kept an ear open for approaching footsteps. Not even an overload of glucose would lessen the risks of being caught watching this stuff. But… There was nothing else on! She didn't want to move from her comfy position lying down on the couch to get the remote! And the little blue dog was so cute! Jinx slapped herself mentally for that last one, hoping to get rid of some of the post-candy sugar rush, before turning back to the TV.

No matter how much she'd deny it if accused, no matter how valiantly she would fight, a tiny bit of her still acquiesced that this wasn't the first time she'd watched this show. There was a tiny tug on the small, minuscule sliver that still gave an equally small, minuscule "aw" at all that is cute- before the rest of her mind shot it down with much gusto and a few mental explosives. Come to think of it, that blasted sliver probably had something to do with the unicorns. And it was absolutely infatuated with this show… and those eyes. She just couldn't resist those deep, soulful eyes. They were staring at her, pleading with her- and she knew just what they wanted… How could she refuse? "Behind you, Steve… a clue!"

"Blue's Clues? To be honest, between this and the unicorns, I'm having a bit of a hard time taking you seriously."

There was no mistaking that confident, casual tone. No chance.

All the telepathic sailors of the world, if they existed and they weren't just the gummy bears lying to Jinx again, winced at the mental tirade that followed _that_ particular comment. She turned slowly, as if delaying the inevitable could make the inevitable grow bored and find someone else to be inevitable with. Unfortunately for Kid Flash, this also gave Jinx the time she needed to get over her deer-in-the-headlights setting and default into really-pissed mode. This was EXACTLY the kind of thing she wanted to avoid. Not only was her plan to appear threatening enough to ward off any further contact than was necessary foiled, but, more importantly, Kid-freaking-Flash now knew that she had a soft spot for black haired TV stars with green shirts and Handy Dandy Notebooks.

By the time Jinx was actually looking at Kid Flash, her glare was so full of steaming hot death that he should have, by all rights, spontaneously combusted where he stood, if he didn't run away screaming. He was saved, however, by the fact that Steve was singing "Here's the mail it never fails it makes me wanna wag my tail..." in the background.

As it was, Kid Flash made a strangled squeaking sound and held up his hands, palms outwards, in the universal don't-hurt-me gesture of males who have just made a very stupid move. "Just kidding, just kidding, no need to get all ma-"

**Thump.**

"Owwww... What do you keep in here, the World Book Encyclopedia? As in, all of them?" Kid Flash looked up rather dazedly from his position on the floor, only slightly upset that he'd just been overbalanced by an oversized messenger bag. After all, Jinx did look rather stunning, especially when she was all lit up from within with righteous rage like that, so he'd been understandably distracted. He indulged in a small moment of disappointment that her hair was still up- he'd wanted to catch her completely unawares for once, when she wasn't pulling up every barrier she had at her disposal. Still, those black, flowy nightclothes with little skulls all over them were obviously the epitome of cute.

"What I keep in there is none of your business," she snapped. "Now, hand it over so I can beat you with it." Screw the not-attacking-him plan; she had a feeling that an unconscious speedster was the best kind of speedster. She leaned over the side of the bed and made a grab for it.

In less than a heartbeat, Kid Flash was up on his feet again and dangling the bag teasingly out of her reach. "Ah-ah, you threw it, I therefore get to look through it..."

Jinx was just opening her mouth to point out that that had made no sense, but she turned it into an indignant screech as he started opening it. "That's _my_ bag, stay out of it!"

"Why, is there something of yours you don't want me knowing about?" he asked, smirking and raising an eyebrow.

_All of it,_ she thought angrily and, with a sudden burst of inspiration, decided to change tactics.

"Idiot, I'm a girl."

Kid Flash had a very, very strong urge to look her up and down very deliberately before nodding to get the point across, but did not on the terms that he was a gentleman, and Romeo didn't send Juliet roses and then look up her dress while she was standing on the balcony. It just wasn't right. And it certainly wasn't the right way to go about getting her to relax around him, although it was a rather funny idea, Jinx obviously wasn't very open to jokes at this point.

Meanwhile, his inner immature teenaged boy shook his head in exasperation and declared him a hopeless case. Still, what did she think, that he didn't _notice? Wow, Jinx, and all this time I thought you were an asexual, pan-dimensional **space-monkey. **Glad we cleared **that** up._

Of course this decision making, Romeo and Juliet comparisons, and all related thinking happened very fast. It was Kid Flash, after all. Fortunately, the many more loose trains of thought that zoomed about in a disorganized manner and crashed into each other have been omitted due to concerns regarding chapter length and general off-topic-ness. Unfortunately, explaining about these trains of thought has brought about even more off-topic blather, so for convenience let us all assume that any thinking Kid Flash does is dangerous, quick, and gets him to decisions in a very odd way.

"And...?" He replied, impatient. What did this have to do with him not finding that delightful sketchbook again? He'd only seen some of her drawings, after all.

"_And_," Jinx continued, as if it were obvious, "I obviously have to keep my... _feminine products _somewhere, don't I?"

Kid Flash dropped the bag next to Jinx's boots as if scalded. "Point taken!" he said quickly, backing up several feet from the bag.

Immediately Jinx dove for the bag and returned to the bed, plopping herself down with minor complaints from the bedsprings. She sat cross-legged and settled the bag in her lap, then rested an elbow on the bag and rested her head on her hand, fixing Kid Flash with an extremely unimpressed look. "You're too easy, you know that?"

He drew himself up in a mock-offended manner and frowned in a way that was somehow still a smile just pretending. "Are you calling me a slut?"

The corner of Jinx's mouth twitched upwards, and she quickly scolded it for mutiny. Unfortunately, Kid Flash was quite observant and had more than a few reasons to pay attention to Jinx, in particular her expressive face, and in particular again her mouth, for completely professional reasons, of course. So, he noticed, and she noticed that he noticed, and she made plans to have those smiling muscles executed while he chocked it up as another victory in his favor while dancing internally. He cut the dance short when it started incorporating hip-thrusting movements and scolded his inner immature teenaged boy.

"No, I'm calling you a, a... an idiotic, naive, gullible fool. You..._ fool._" Wow, Jinx, that was brilliant. She snorted at her own lack of creative insults. But how was she supposed to accuse and insult at her best when she hadn't had a good night's sleep in... in... Well, she hadn't slept since that last drafty, uncomfortable warehouse. A good night's sleep without anxiety twisting her stomach, she didn't want to bother spending the time remembering. It always made her feel the tiniest bit pathetic.

"Wow, how much sleep have you _gotten?_"

_How does he **know!**_

"Um, well, for starters, you have lines under your eyes, you're not insulting me as creatively as usual, you haven't tried to hex me into oblivion once yet during this whole conversation, and... You're muttering under your breath."

_Dammit._

"Yeah, like that."

Jinx was irked, not only at the fact that he was so perceptive, but also that he was so frigging innocent and concerned about it. "Hey, it's not _my_ fault that it took your ass over seven hours to get back home. A bit slow for the fastest boy alive. Slowing down? Or, more likely, were you out for some sort of late-night booty call?"

This was so ridiculous that Kid Flash really couldn't help doubling over with laughter. Jinx, who'd already had enough of being mocked for several lifetimes, just tried to calm down by watching the ending theme of Blue's Clues. Her fingertips had started to tingle with little sparks, the beginnings of a hex, and she was sure her eyes were two steps from glowing. Honestly, she'd thought it was a logical explanation. She'd seen far too much from far too many people, and Kid Flash seemed the type to have a number of girls on call. Still, this was pretty much the only reaction he could have given that wouldn't at least partially confirm her suspicions, and she supposed the fact that she was temporarily living with someone with at least some morals was, to say the least, relieving.

Not to mention that she would totally kick his ass if he left her roses and then proceeded to do the same thing for twenty other girls.

"Whoooo. Okay, hold on." Catching his breath and occasionally bursting out into laughter again, Kid Flash sat down heavily on the bed next to Jinx and flopped onto his back, eyes closed. Jinx, unsettled, felt the muscles in her neck and back tense as she regarded him warily, clutching her messenger bag to her chest and narrowing one eye more than the other.

When he showed no signs of bothering her, she reached over and gave his side a solid poke. "You dead?"

He didn't answer, just opened one sky-blue eye and peered up at her through a few tufts of hair that just had to be rebellious and fall down into his eyes so he couldn't see and occasionally mowed down a mailbox. Then, he proceeded to throw Jinx completely off course. "Do you ever relax?"

She blinked, taken aback despite the fact that he pulled this on her all the time. "What are you talking about?"

He sighed and sat up. Jinx scooted an inch away from him uncomfortably. He noticed this with a bit of irritation. Well, at least she wasn't yelling at him yet, but there was no point pushing any issue at all at this point. "To answer your question, I got called out to watch a fire- generally Jump City can take care of itself, especially with the lull in crime lately, but they wanted me on the job to make sure no one got hurt. Then I got roped into the whole news-report thing, and then I got detained by crazy fans, and usually I'd get away from all this, but there were a few kids there, and they were pretty freaked out. I ended up watching them until their parents got through all the legal crap and finally just told the reporters to bugger off. Then I did some clean-up and a patrol of the city, but of course that didn't take long." He shrugged. "Still, the whole thing ended up taking a long time in the end."

Jinx nodded, ignoring that persistent little sliver of cute-loving idiocy clamoring at her. "And I guess the Titans have you watching Jump City while they're looking for the Brotherhood of Evil?"

"Yep!" he replied cheerfully, getting up to go make himself some food. "Got myself a communicator and all that jazz. Here, catch."

He tossed the communicator and Jinx caught it, not fumbling despite her surprise. She eyed him dubiously through the doorway as he bustled around the kitchen like a total Mr. Mom. "You realize that I could just run and do all sorts of diabolical things with this, yes?"

He shook his head at her from the kitchen, while zipping about, creating what looked like a small seal made out of god-knows-what in between two slices of bread. "Naah, I know you wouldn't. You act tough, but really, I know you're just like a r-"

"Don't start using that metaphorical rose bull on me." She snorted and got up, grabbing her empty mug and going to wash it. Kid Flash promptly took it out of her grasp and washed it with his super-speed, while Jinx ignored this encroachment on her washing territory in favor of her tirade. "Roses are pretty and smell nice, but if you start comparing me to one, I will _hurt you._"

Kid Flash watched with a small hint of amusement, finishing his sandwich as she brandished the Titans communicator at him. "Really. Well, what do you prefer more for your metaphors then? Two creams, one sugar, hold the cliché?"

Jinx waved the device again in a grand gesture. "I don't know, a... a hedgehog."

"A hedgehog?"

"Sure. Hedgehogs, they get no credit for their, um, metaphorical potential."

"Prickly on the outside and soft on the inside. Aww, that's sweet. Does that mean you like beds of wood shavings, too?"

Jinx, in a move influenced by the last bit of glucose in her system, promptly stuck her tongue out at him, before putting down the communicator and walking back to the bed. "I wasn't referring to me, idiot, I was just talking generalities."

"Sooo... Does that mean I should start leaving you assorted small mammals instead of flowers?" Kid Flash turned off the kitchen light and followed her back into the living room area.

"Not if you want to keep all your vital organs," came the saccharine sweet reply. "As if you'd actually start giving out hedgehogs." A less saccharine and much less ladylike snort followed.

Kid Flash chuckled and opened the door to what Jinx had correctly identified as the bedroom. It was in the same style as the rest of the apartment, the walls a neutral cream shade and the drapes a deeper reddish mahogany, with patterned covers on the bed that reminded Jinx of hotels. She supposed it was sort of like a hotel... if the Titans were just bringing him in while they were gone, she supposed he really lived somewhere else and this was just a secondary home.

"Well, I'm going to sleep. 'Night." he said, closing the door. Jinx eyed the doorway, and Kid Flash stopped closing the door to raise an eyebrow at her. "I usually keep this door closed, hope you don't mind. It's not like I'm going to sleep in this suit... Unless you'd like me to leave it open- free show."

He pulled the door shut before the pillow, thrown by Jinx, could hit him in the face. His chuckles emanated from behind the door, and Jinx rolled her eyes while allowing herself a smile now that there was a door between them. With a contented sigh, she slid under the covers and reached over to turn off the lamp. Sleep, surprisingly, came easy that night, the only thing running through her dreams the quiet, echoing laughter of someone waiting just out of reach.

* * *

**End A/N**: Wow. How many people are left at this point? Fortunately, I posted that last chapter and found it short, so I tried to make this one longer. Unfortunately, I think I may have scared a few people with some of this nonsense. Sorry guys.

And now the moment you've all been waiting for, Ri-Ri's E/N. Read. Read, or I will grind your bones to make my bread.

**E/N**: I'm a bit jealous. Re-Ane started with shorter, easier to manage chapters, so it doesn't take her as long to get something out. Me, oh no, have to make fudging long chapters… It's a wonder Re-Ane edits for me, as it must be a serious pain for her to go through everything and worm out all my mistakes. And apparently, I don't need to threaten readers any more for reviews. (scans about) You're all doing fine on your own, I'm glad! (But if you don't review, my previous threats still stand, and I'll be willing to add more, ohhhh yess…)

Hmmm… What will happen? Will Jinx actually get some sleep and properly threaten Kid Flash for once? Will the famous hedgehogs find their way into the next chapter? Will my editor's notes ever actually be important? Probably not, but then, even I don't know! (dramatic hand movements)

I'd do separate reviewer responses here, but I'm pretty sure they're not allowed anymore. Emo tear. So I'll just send out a general thank you, you guys are awesome- also, regarding the story/Author's Notes separation. I generally don't think I'll need to use the line for scene changes because a) I can use something else and b) man I didn't even change times/p.o.v. in this chapter. And if I did, it was a paragraph-to-paragraph subtle (blaringly glaringly obvious) kind of thing. Finally, some of you reviewers have awesome stories- I'll be faving and reviewing possibly tomorrow, but right now I am tired. And kind of dead. DX

Next chapter will probably include hedgehogs and possible dismemberment. Jinx may also go job hunting if she doesn't die of a heartastroke.

Review if you want to, and help me go mad with power. ;)


	3. Aren't You Cold?

**A/N:** Look, new chapter. A few days late even for my original chapter-a-week deadline. –nervous laughter- So you can, you know, put the weapons away. Um… look! Chapter. Disembodied chickens, waffles and a bit of romantic fluff ahead. And also probably more silliness, but that's to be expected.

* * *

Morning had dawned cold and frozen long ago, and Jinx was just waking up. Her ascension into the waking world was slow and lazy, more like a physical pull than her waking up of her own will. She protested every step of the way, grumbling sleepy protests. 

_Jiiinx... Jinx, wake up..._

"No," she told the persistent voice. "Go away."

_Jinx, you're going to have to wake up sometime. Aren't you cold?_

Disembodied voices weren't supposed to make sense. It just wasn't _allowed. _Stupid disembodied voices. Breaking the rules all the time.

"A little..." she admitted, and was immediately swamped with lethargic irritation at herself for being so civil. "Just stop talking. I'm trying to sleep. I didn't ask you to talk and I just want to lie down."

_You are lying down. But c'mon, it's time to get back up. You can do it._

That last comment was unneeded. It was too early in the morning for sarcasm. "Stop being sarcastic and give me five more minutes."

_Fine, fine, but I wasn't being sarcastic. I'll let you wake up on your own for now but I'll be right in the kitchen if you need help._

Kitchen? Why did the disembodied voices have a kitchen? What did disembodied voices eat anyways, disembodied chickens? Souls, maybe? Well they had better stay away from hers. It was probably all crusty like old pizza. And it'd never taste as good as it used to even if you heated it in a disembodied microwave. The chickens would definitely taste better, so why the heck was a disembodied voice bothering with _her?_

Furthermore, why did the disembodied voice sound like Kid Fl—oh.

With a groan, Jinx wrenched herself from her half-asleep state and opened her eyes to see a curious little face. It most certainly wasn't Kid Flash, though. It wasn't even human. And it was _sitting_ on her.

"AAAAAHHH!" cried Jinx.

"EEEEEEE!" screamed the thing.

Jinx swept it off her and watched as the spiky little thing _bounced _on the bed, scooting back frantically before-

**Fwumph.**

"I need to stop sleeping so close to the end of the bed..." grumbled Jinx, blowing ineffectively at a bit of hair falling in her eyes. At least she fell on carpet, but she'd forgotten to take down her hair last night and it was probably even more of a mess now... Grumbling under her breath, she attempted to arrange herself into more dignified position.

Then, carefully, cautiously, she rose up and peeked over the side of the bed. The _thing_ was still there, unmoving, and spiky as ever. She slowly rose to her full height and leaned over it, watching as it expanded and contracted ever so slightly.

Her breath rushing out in a small sigh, Jinx smacked herself on the forehead lightly. It was just an animal. An animal that happened to be sitting on her when she woke up, but it wasn't about to eat her. In fact, it looked like she had scared the poor little thing.

She reached out a hand more confidently, lightly running it down one of the spikes. It was smooth and not sharp enough to hurt her, white banded by black and shading to brown at the end. The little creature shook in a little sneeze and Jinx jumped despite herself.

Hearing what sounded like a quickly smothered chuckle, Jinx whipped around and glared at the doorway to the kitchen. She couldn't quite see inside, but she was sure that the speedster idiot was in there, gorging himself on whatever and laughing, like always.

A little more snarky and the slightest bit more awake, Jinx looked around. She had thrown the covers off her when she slept, apparently, and Kid Flash had opened the curtains to the windows. Light from a frosty afternoon streamed in the window and gave a cold tint to the neutral colors of the apartment.

Frowning at the fact that she'd slept right through that idiot bumbling about doing whatever, Jinx reached down yet again and picked up the little creature. Yawning, she strode over to the doorway of the kitchen assuredly, peering in with a hand on her hip and the other holding the ball of spikes.

"What, may I ask, is this?" she narrowed an eye and waved her arm a bit for emphasis.

Kid Flash turned away from the microwave to beam in a way that was far too cheery for whatever time it was at the moment. "It—well, he—is a hedgehog."

Jinx regarded him blankly while Kid Flash beamed on. Her hair was mussed up and her eyes were squinting against even the feeble kitchen light, and she still looked nice enough to make him stare. She pulled the side of her pajama top back over her shoulder where it was slipping and his eyes followed the movement.

"A hedgehog," she repeated, blinking a few times and glancing down at the ball of spikes that was, indeed, beginning to uncurl and show its fuzzy face and beady, shining eyes.

"Well, the owner of the pet shop told me that it was part Labrador retriever and would gladly guard the apartment, but I think they were just trying to be rid of it. But seeing as you wanted one so badly for their... 'metaphorical potential,' I believe, I think you'll be able to overlook that."

He winked.

She looked murderous.

"Wait, don't shoot!" Kid Flash cried over her shout of 'Give me one good reason why I shouldn't...!' "I offer you these waffles in exchange for the safety of all my vital organs!"

Jinx paused and stared again as he held out a plate full of, indeed, waffles. Hmm… They DID look tasty, and it was a bit early in the morning to hex something into oblivion...

_It's never too early to hex something into oblivion. Eat the waffles and kill the boy! _

Jinx shook her head at her own mind's suggestion and stifled a chuckle. She looked at the hedgehog, the waffles, and Kid Flash himself before two things happened at once: she smelled the wonderful delicious scent of cooked waffles, and she noticed that Kid Flash wasn't wearing his uniform, or his mask.

Well, he was wearing clothes. Just not the uniform. Jinx hoped that she would notice someone being naked sooner than that.

"Fine, fine," she relented, looking away. "But if these waffles are... I don't know, poisoned or something, it's your spleen on E-Bay buying me a seat in First Class on the next flight out of here."

That said, she grabbed the plate and a set of silverware without meeting his eyes and retreated to the table nearby. He sat down a seat away from her and watched as she contemplated the waffles, deeply.

"They're not poisoned, you know. Watch." He grabbed one of the sticky treats off her plate and bit into it while Jinx used this as an excuse to stare at him. His hair was a bit less spiky than normal, combed down in some attempt at keeping it from being too unruly. Behind where the mask usually sat was a slight dusting of freckles underneath lighthearted blue eyes.

Realizing that he'd already finished the waffle (_glutton_, her mind sighed) and that she didn't have a reason for staring so long, she huffed and grabbed a fork and began to eat with deliberate slowness, hoping that his monkey brain would see this and learn that waffles and other food were oftentimes to be consumed with _utensils._

"Shouldn't you be protecting your secret identity by wearing a mask, or leaving all the lights off or something?" She asked finally, narrowing an eye.

"Naah, my secret's safe with you, right?" He looked up from the hedgehog, which he'd been prodding at in an attempt to make it uncurl. So far he seemed pretty unsuccessful, but at least the hedgehog wasn't growling or anything. "It's not like I need to fool you."

"As if you could." She rolled her eyes and finished her last waffle, and Kid Flash contented himself with the fact that she hadn't threatened to use this information to bring about his downfall and take over the world and etc. etc. etc. Not that he thought she would actually go through with something like that, but he wouldn't put it past her to threaten to do it.

Jinx, finished, stood and grabbed her plate, frowning at her sticky fingers. And she'd used a fork and everything. Shrugging on the way to the kitchen, she attempted to lick off the rest of the sugary goodness in lieu of using napkins, which were unsurprisingly absent.

Kid Flash, meanwhile, relinquished his protests at her last comment to watch her avidly from the corner of his eye while taking an abnormally long time to pick up the hedgehog. And people always said it was a bad thing he didn't keep napkins around... His mind drifted off into a muddy, happy daze.

Hmm. She appeared to be saying something. He should probably be paying attention.

"Whuh?" _Quick thinking there, Wally. Distract her from the fact that you weren't paying attention to what she was saying by dazzling her with your rapier wit. Woo._

Jinx rolled her eyes at his lack of concentration, washing her hands in the sink and looking over her shoulder at him as he walked in. "I _said_: I'm amazed that you're not speeding around like the speedy idiot you are. Shouldn't you be out, you know, saving the day or something?"

"Well, excuse me if I'm offending you with my presence instead of being out and about fighting dragons and being chivalrous. I already did my rounds this morning, several times. And I have that spiffy thing called a Titans Communicator for whenever I'm needed. So until then, I'm _incognito._"

She frowned at him as he wrapped up his mini-speech and violated her washing territory again, using super speed to clean her dishware and put it in a wire basket on the counter to dry. "Well, Mr. Incognito, nice job blowing your cover there."

He rolled his eyes at her this time. "Oh noes! I have revealed my super-secret superhero identity. Now that you have discovered, for the first time, that I am indeed Kid Flash, I am surely _doomed_."

"Oh shut up, it's too early in the morning for sarcasm." Jinx echoed her earlier thoughts and plodded off to get her bag.

"It's 1:24 in the afternoon!" he called after her, and only received the slam of the bathroom door in reply.

Jinx half-hoped that Kid Flash would be gone by the time that she finished dressing, but he was still there when she stepped out of the bathroom, sitting on the now folded-up couch and amusing himself by amusing the hedgehog with a toilet paper tube and feeding it bits of what looked like chicken.

All in all, they both looked pretty amused. Jinx didn't think this said much for Kid Flash's intelligence.

He noticed her, looked up and whistled. "Good morning, Mrs. Incognito. Going somewhere?"

She rolled her eyes at him and tugged her hat further down over her head. "Casual wear for me to go out and get a job. You got a newspaper somewhere around here?"

He lifted an eyebrow and stretched before looking around the apartment, thinking before snapping his fingers and bouncing off to sift through a pile of papers on a desk by a cabinet-looking thing in the living room. "Casual wear? Do you really think you won't stand out in a getup like that?"

He paused and looked back at her with both eyebrows raised, glad at the excuse to stare at her some more. She was finally in street clothes, but rather dark ones—dark jeans, black shirt ("I'm surrounded by idiots," it proclaimed in bold white lettering), a slim, rectangular set of sunglasses obscuring her eyes with help from... a cloth hat, witch-like in design, black with green stripes...? Her hair was down for a change, part of it tied back with a spare bit of cloth and the strands that were too short to be tied back framing her face. Still, it didn't change the fact that her hair was shockingly pink.

She snorted, stealing his place on the couch and taking up his place amusing the hedgehog. "If you think this is going to stand out, you haven't visited your local mall for, what, years? People dress like this all over the place. Heck, I'm practically average. Not wearing a corset or anything."

Kid Flash steered his thoughts firmly away from corsets and turned back to looking for a newspaper, shrugging. "Well, excuse me if I've been too busy 'saving the day' to notice the huge army of pink-haired, hat-wearing people just lying in wait until the time is right to strike."

His tone was teasing, but Jinx was still hesitant. She wasn't sure if it was her place to ask or not... He was extremely open with her, almost excessively so, but still... Oh well. It wasn't like _she_ was going to worry if she offended him or not. And she _refused_ to do that ridiculous asking-if-you-can-ask-a-question thing.

"Umm, hey... Can I ask you a question...?"

_Dammit! Damn you, deceitful brain! You've betrayed me!_

"Sure." His back was turned to her and she contemplated his worn, baggy jeans and grey hoodie (he was obviously going for nondescript), until she realized that she was a) staring, b) drooling, and c) supposed to be asking a question.

"Well, you say you're too busy 'saving the day' to notice, but you still do it. I mean... Are you..." _Happy? _"Okay with that...?"

He turned again, and peered down at her, and she craned her neck to get an upside down look at him, her sunglasses falling back and obscuring her eyes as she leaned her head back against the arm of the couch.

"I get by." He looked contemplative for a moment, the look so out of place and so serious with cold light dusting across his face and hair, even though she was seeing it wrong way up, that Jinx didn't reply. "But, you know, I'd be happier if..."

"...If?"

Then Jinx thought the moment was gone, and she could breathe again, until he stepped forward, facing the armrest where she stared up at him through dark sunglasses, and leaned down over her with a smile that was just a few shades from a smirk. Her whole body automatically stiffened at just the light brush of his hand against her shoulder as he placed it next to her face on the armrest. She tried to look at it and when her eyes darted back up he was much, much too close for comfort.

Then her attention was drawn away from the sudden warmth in her shoulder as his face bypassed hers and sent sparks shooting along the side of her cheek from having his a hair's breadth away. She felt a surge of something that she would vehemently deny was disappointment until she felt the warm brush of his breath against the shell of her ear. A few stray strands of fiery hair brushed against her neck, making her pulse leap and forcing her to suppress a shudder as her brain sluggishly tried to determine what he whispered in her ear.

"_...If I had some mustard. We're nearly out."_

Kid Flash had about .5 seconds to savor the moment, pull back and drink in her dazed look before she launched a war cry and went for his neck. Her hands closed on a newspaper, which she straightened with a rustling _snap _while Kid Flash sent a desperate plea to any gods or deities who would consider saving a 'helpless boy, threatened by imminent dismemberment, poisoning, death, etc., without a snowball's chance in hell on national flamethrower Friday.'

Jinx glanced at the date while Kid Flash tried to remember if he'd finalized his funeral arrangements and will, and if he even _had_ a will. She then rolled up the paper and promptly brought it down on Kid Flash's stupid head.

**Whap.**

Ahh, it was like all her anxieties were draining out of her. So therapeutic...

**Whap. Whap. Whap. WHAP. WHAPWHAPWHAPWHAPWHAP _WHAP._**

"The stars...! They're so close I can almost taste them...!"

Jinx snorted, put a hand on her hip, straightened her hat and glared down at Kid Flash's crumpled form, strewn across the couch when he'd fallen after the... fifth 'whap' or so. The hedgehog looked unperturbed and was more interested in its cardboard tube.

"Number one, what do you mean '_we're_ nearly out?' This is only a temporary stay until I can get enough money or a steady job, to get my own place or get the heck away from here. Number two, that's _last_ Sunday's paper." She resisted the urge to pout when he sat up, without any visible crippling injuries. She'd have to hit harder next time. Oh well, maybe he had some internal bleeding or something. "Number three, one of these days you are going to choke to death on mustard, and I will stand over your fallen body, and _laugh_."

"Ouch, my heart. It hurts." He clutched at his chest dramatically and fell backwards again. Jinx wondered at this for a moment before throwing up her hands, spinning around and stalking off.

"I give up! I'm off to find myself a job and try to gain back the IQ I lose talking to you." She reached into her messenger bag and pulled out a black cloth coat, shrugging into it as she strode to the door.

"Wait, wait!" Kid Flash bounced up from the couch and hopped a few times to catch his balance as his foot caught in one of the couch cushions. "I know a good place looking for employees, let me help!"

The apartment door closed on their bickering and the hedgehog slept on contentedly in its cardboard tube.

* * *

**End A/N:** Many thanks to my reviewers and of course my beta Ri-Ri who puts up with my idiocy. X3 Sorry if the story seems to be a little slow. I'm going to tie this all together with canon and go beyond, I swear. 

Now, Ri's E/N. Read, read or I will seduce everyone you've ever really loved.

**E/N:** Is that an alliteration I spy? Corrupting Re-Ane, I am, with my alliterated anarchy.

Aren't KF and Jinx cute with their flirting? There was something on the news this morning about flirting being good for your health or something... (shrugs) Oh, well. It's fun getting to edit because I read the chapter ahead of everybody else! Not that Re-Ane isn't prompt with her updates anyways. (Though she was a little late with this one...)

Next chapter: Possibly a new group of villains-on-the-block who know rather a lot more than they ought to. And, what's this? The faintest hint of a plot? There's a _plot_? Surely you jest.

If it suits your fancy, review and help me erode human souls. 


	4. Good Luck

1A/N: Look, Valentine's Day update. Okay, not really, it's past midnight. But, hey, close enough is what I say. I'm losing sleep to bring this thing to you, be grateful! shakes fist

Okay, in this chapter is a bit of funny, some silliness, some oddness, a bit of dragging filler and some sleepy fluff. I'm not really happy with this, so expect next chapter to be filled with more actual plot development and other stuff I left out of this chapter for certain reasons, explained in the end A/N. It will also not be completed at 1:30 A.M.

Also, I am using OC's in this chapter, because I have to, dammit. The Titans are not here. The villains are mostly not here. So, I tried to make them interesting and three-dimensional (more of this may come a bit later, as an extremely side side side note but connected to some main character development or something), at least, but I'll try to keep the focus away from them as much as possible.

Also, this chapter is UNEDITED as my beta can't get caught up this late right now. I will fix this tomorrow and until then you are going to have to deal with horrible glaring absentminded errors. D:

Onward, if you dare.

* * *

It really was a nice day. At least, Jinx thought so. Alright, so it was still freezing cold despite the fact that there wasn't a cloud in the sky. Okay, there was snow all over the ground that had, yet again, magically found its way into her boots. Yeah, she hated walking down the street and only being able to think 'I robbed that place!' or 'I had a run-in with the leader of a crime ring in that alley!' or 'Gizmo got his head stuck in that fence when he was on surveillance duty!'

She almost chuckled at that last one, but soon lapsed back into a thoughtful mood. She wanted to be left alone to her melancholy thoughts, and this beautiful- Well, okay. Who was she kidding? It was freezing. The sun was glaring in her eyes. This day was terrible. But...

"Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Are we..."

It made a nice distraction in regards to annoying idiots who wouldn't shut up.

Jinx tried to ignore him and his incessant chatter. Really, she did. She marveled at the pretty little trees with their pretty little mini-fences placed at intervals in the sidewalks of Jump City. She watched other people, bundled up in their own coats, their own lives, walk by. She gawked at a few adorable little birdies fluttering about, wondering why they were here during winter and why they wouldn't get the hint and just piss off to where it was warmer.

Then she realized that her last thought ended on a sour note, gave up the charade, and tried to incinerate Kid Flash with her _mind_. Unfortunately, all that happened was that a man on the other side of the street tripped and fell into a snowdrift.

Finally she snapped and glared daggers at him. "Why do you insist on asking that? We aren't in a car. You aren't five years old. You don't know where we're going. I don't know where I'm going. You might not even want to know where we're going. I might get lost and we'll both get hit by a meteor and_ die_. Maybe you'll give in to your obvious inner insanity and try to attack me with a crowbar or something. Really, it would be better if you just left. Now."

To her chagrin, Kid Flash seemed entirely unaffected and just smiled congenially from under the hood he'd pulled over his head to protect himself from the cold. "It doesn't matter where we're going. And what's with all those maybes? I _like_ being by you. So really, it's not always where you're going, but how you get there."

"Then why are you asking if we're _there_ yet?" she asked, exasperated. The daggers she'd been glaring at him were now upgraded to swords , pitchforks, and torches.

He simply continued to grin unabashedly. "To get a rise out of you."

Jinx was silent for a moment, apparently dumbfounded by his audacity, and a few scythes with nice decorative marble skulls on them were added to her ocular arsenal. "Well, it's _working,_" she hissed, making an extremely angry warning noise in the back of her throat.

Now Kid Flash paused for a moment, even going so far as to stop walking. Jinx continued on, somewhat aimlessly, although she had a vague idea of where she was going. Then he trotted back up to her, asking incredulously, "Did you just _growl_ at me?" He paused again, thinking. "Hey, that's kinda sexy."

Jinx knew that even when he was posing as a civilian, she had no chance of catching the fastest boy alive, but it didn't stop her from chasing him through the streets of Jump City. When they finally stopped, Kid Flash wasn't even winded and Jinx had to bend over with her hands on her knees, gasping for air.

Finally, her breathing slowed, and she looked up at the building she had stopped in front of- Some sort of place for embossing, apparently. She looked at the building next to it and smiled at the 'Help Wanted' sign.

"Ha!" She pointed to it, feeling particularly immature but not caring. "Job opportunity. Soon enough I can pay you rent and get my own place. No more waking up to small mammals sitting on me!" She would have done a silly little dance if she'd been generally inclined to do silly little dances, which she wasn't.

Kid Flash shook his head, holding up his hands. "You don't have to pay me rent Jinx, I can't take your money."

Knowing that this would just be one of those issues where arguing wouldn't work and she'd just have to trick him into accepting rent, she just shrugged and replied, "Not yet you can't, because I don't have any, because I need a_ job_."

Knowing that this would just be one of those issues where arguing wouldn't work and he'd just have to trick her into not paying rent, he looked into the building through a large picture window. "Ooo, and I've been here before too. Nice place, nice people, and the food is exquisite."

Jinx cocked an eyebrow at him, pushing open the door and stepping into a homey place that smelled heavenly. "Exquisite? Wow, don't hurt yourself there, that's some pretty advanced vocabulary for you."

"Yeah, I think I strained something coming up with that one." Kid Flash looked upwards, mock-alarmed, and Jinx looked away from the ridiculous picture he made and studied her surroundings to keep from laughing.

The walls were painted some vague, probably oddly-named color of white that was really cream-colored, and contrasted nicely with the dark wood making up the furniture. There was a long counter to the right of them, and little tables and booths were scattered about the place, some of them filled with customers eating and talking quietly. Hanging lights had amber-colored glass shades around them, and the whole place gave off an aura of warmth. Across the room from the counter were a few bookshelves, and a female worker with dirty blonde, red-tinged hair, was tidying it up.

"It's a nice place, and like I said, the food is great," Kid Flash explained, "but really, everyone comes here for the..."

Just then, the worker tidying up the bookshelves turned around and spotted them. Jinx noticed her thin-rimmed silver glasses and brown eyes before she promptly threw her arms into the air and declared, "Holy elephant bagels, it's him! Someone hide the coffee!"

She then proceeded to run up to the counter and attempted to slide over a clear area of it in a dramatic manner, but fell off too soon and landed on the other side out of view with a dull thump.

A few of the patrons looked up from their tables, alarmed. A few looked up, noticed what had happened, and looked back down. Some didn't even bat an eyelash. Apparently the last ones were the regulars, and more alarmingly, this was a normal occurrence.

"Nice people?" asked Jinx, looking at her companion dubiously.

He shrugged. "By nice, I mean that they're all kinda stark raving mad."

"Ah," she said, and couldn't think of anything else to say.

Another woman, shorter and stockier than the first, sauntered up to the counter and leaned naturally dark and tanned arms on the counter. Her dark brown hair was pulled back in a braid, and her light hazel eyes twinkled mischievously. "Heya there, welcome back. Whaddya want?"

Jinx began to walk towards the counter. It figured that people knew him, superhero or not- he was a very magnetic, social, outgoing person. Kid Flash walked up just behind her, then remembered something and hit himself on the forehead.

He reached forward and pulled Jinx back against him in a swift movement, and murmured in her ear. "Also, while we're like this, you can call me Wally West."

He then looked up into four sets of staring eyes and realized that if he'd wanted to do that subtly, that probably hadn't been the best way. Oh well. It was worth it, anyways.

Jinx fought the beginnings of a blush. What had the twit been thinking? Oh, right, he _hadn't_, because he had a tub of_ lard_ where his _brain_ was supposed to go. The woman was staring, 'Tyl' had popped up from behind the counter with a crossword puzzle and a pen she had apparently found down there and was staring, a third woman in a violently purple jacket returning with an empty tray to the kitchens was staring, and a guy from the kitchens about to take the empty tray was staring. The other people in the kitchens would have been staring, too, if they could.

"Soooooooo," purred the dark-haired woman. "Who's this?"

Jinx frowned and spoke up. "I'm Rebecca Reynolds." That was average enough, right? She hadn't exactly given it much thought, and that was the first thing she could say without stuttering.

"The girly can speak for herself. It's a miracle." the girl in the purple jacket shoved the tray on the cook and walked over to the counter, extending her left purple-clothed hand to shake a confused Jinx's. "I'm Lynette, or Lyn, and now I have to make sure the fools don't burn anything." She turned the cook around and marched him back into the kitchens.

"Well, I'm Samantha ("Sammie!" interjected Tyl happily), and I must say this is an improvement from the other girls dearest Wally brings in here." the dark-haired woman sighed and 'dearest Wally' started sweating bullets. _Honestly, Sam, do you_ want _me lynched!_

However, Jinx only shrugged. "I would imagine so, considering all the idiot air heads seem to flock to him." Oh, as if she hadn't seen the _fan club_. All the blonde, highlighted, self-tanned, horribly vacant people on TV whenever they were shown always gave Jinx a headache. And seeing as Kid Flash going 'incognito,' in Jinx's view, consisted of trying to keep his attention span problems in check and adding a bit more of a sarcastic suave attitude in place of a hyper snark-off attitude, that brand of female probably still followed him when he was a civilian.

"And she doesn't slap him, call him a cheating bastard, and walk off in search of 'the whore'! It's a miracle!" Sam cheered, and promptly pulled Jinx into a bone-crushing hug over the counter.

Jinx found this all very strange. Was it normal to be hugged by an almost-complete stranger? Was it a bad thing that she couldn't remember when she'd last been hugged? She didn't remember very well, but she was pretty sure that hugs weren't supposed to restrict breathing.

Finally, Sam released her, and Jinx rubbed at her side but felt happy in a sort of bruised way.

Then Sam paused, and looked at Wally. Jinx looked at Sam and was glad she wasn't hearing things, and it was Sam who spoke up. "Um, unless I'm mistaken, I think your pants are currently playing Beethoven's 3rd symphony."

"Oh, yeah. I downloaded these awesome new pants ringtones. I was going to program them to play the Macarena but that was ten cents extra." Wally sighed sadly, and Sam chuckled.

"Okay, you get out of here then, we'll take care of the girly," Lynette poked her head out of the kitchen.

Apparently this had happened before, and Jinx recognized the ringing for what it was- that of the Titans' Communicator, disguised to sound like a cell phone, probably. "Yeah, get the hell out before I lose my patience and hit you or something." Jinx pushed him towards the door, and he waved merrily before disappearing outside.

Not even twenty seconds later, and Kid Flash was already deep in conversation with the police inside of a museum. The alarm had come too late, apparently, not set off until the thief left, and probably set off then on purpose.

There wasn't much for Kid Flash to do there, a team of detectives already searching the crime scene, but they assured him that they'd give him any information they found. With a lack of anything better to do, Kid Flash searched the city, although he doubted that he'd just find the culprit that way. Indeed, all that he accomplished was taking down a few petty criminals trying the usual and helping the police force, although he did do a lot of thinking.

Now, finally, he'd finished his rounds yet again and was disguised as Wally West, his thought process slowing down slightly and dragging now that he was tired. Stumbling into the shop wearily, he waved at Sam.

"I know who you're here for- the spark shooter went home. Well, I sent her home. She's a good worker, especially for a newbie, but I'm closing early today and I sent Tyl, Lyn and the cooks home already. Here." She reached under the counter and produced a bag of food, placing it in his hands. "It's Saturday. Go home, watch a movie, and, oh," she paused here and looked up at him seriously. "That spark shooter. Twitchy, as issue-ridden as the rest of us put together on a bad day, evasive as hell. Have fun, boy."

Wally sighed and headed for the door, looking over his shoulder. "You think I have a chance?"

She shrugged. "If you really wanna reach her, of all people, you'll probably be able to. We're always here to help, too. Strong girl. I like her. Good luck, buddy."

He smiled. "Thanks," and he was gone again.

So, he cheated a bit and sped back to his apartment. He was tired, the food smelled good, and Jinx was probably waiting for him.

"Luuucy, I'm hoo-ooome!" cried Kid Flash in a high voice, kicking open and closing the door with his foot.

"No entrance without food!" called Jinx from the living room.

Kid Flash snorted. "Come and get it, I'm gonna get some plates from the kitchen.

"Sammie is a god among men who knows good food and has inventive insults. I praise her for this gift of food," Jinx murmured reverently, unwrapping the meal.

"If we sacrifice a goat to her I bet we can get extra ketchup," snickered Kid Flash as he grabbed his share.

"Yeah, or more likely she'll hand you a mop and make you clean goat entrails off her nice clean floor."

"'Well I'm glad you've realized by godliness, now scrub, buddy, the liver's already sliding halfway to the bathroom.'" Kid Flash only found it slightly alarming that his impression wasn't that much of a stretch.

They both settled by the couch and spent a surprisingly companionable afternoon watching movies and throwing food at each other. The hedgehog had its fill of food, too, and at the end of the day two sated, sleepy beings shared a couch in front of the TV. The hedgehog was sleeping on top of a desk.

Kid Flash was leaning against the back of the couch, running over the bits of the crime scene that he'd had a chance to see. The energy the food had given him had faded, and now he was feeling the weight of the day on his shoulders. And he still hadn't mentioned to Jinx that the crime he'd been pulled to look at was from the same museum where he'd first left her a rose, the only stolen item the one that she had been seeking.

Of course, the police were all ready to send him after Jinx, but Kid Flash had explained, rather haltingly, that he was pretty sure that Jinx wasn't a suspect. The police of Jump City didn't quite know him, and they didn't quite trust his opinion, either- They hadn't looked convinced.

Sighing, without thinking Kid Flash went to lie down, and ended with his head in Jinx's lap, staring up into her startled face.

He closed his eyes and waited for his obviously inevitable demise.

Hmm. No pain. Had she been merciful and killed him soundlessly? Was he already dead?

He creaked open an eye fearfully, and she stared down at him, amused at his reaction.

"I'm not dead," he squeaked, amazed.

She tried to ignore him as well as she could. "Is that a problem? I can remedy it for you."

"No, no," he assured her quickly, "That's quite alright."

A moment later and Kid Flash was still not dead. Jinx was watching the TV. He thought it was safe to assume that she would not be shouting 'JUST KIDDING, YOU'RE DEAD SUCKER' and beheading him anytime soon. That didn't mean it made any more sense.

She mumbled something and ran a hand through his hair.

"...Hmmmm...?" Kid Flash's eyes were half-lidded, and he was quite sure that his smile was in the dopey range. "You're going to have to repeat that. The hand-thing, too."

"Yeah, right. I _said_, your hair is a spiky mess, and I think you should, maybe, _comb_ it or something. You know, where people pull that instrument through their hair and make it obey some sort of law called gravity."

"Uh-huh," he agreed, only half-knowing what he was agreeing to. "Now, I didn't quite catch that other thing, so, you know, you can just go back to petting me to see how much of a, um, spiky mess I am."

She scoffed at him and to his surprise, toyed with his hair absentmindedly as she watched TV. He hadn't thought that she'd actually continue with the whole I'm-not-going-to-kill-you-and-am-instead-going-to-show-you-why-pets-are-such-lucky-bastards thing. In fact, he really hadn't been thinking much for the last few moments.

Jinx continued to run her hands through the fiery strands, occasionally scraping her nails against Kid Flash's scalp and making him shiver. She was surprisingly gentle, and the texture to her hands, so used to fighting and hard work, couldn't have been any better if they'd been treated by all the moisturizers in the world.

The whole thing, from a removed standpoint, was very relaxing, as was to be expected. Kid Flash nearly hummed with contentment and found himself relaxing completely.

In other words, he melted into a puddle of goop.

"Are you... purring?" She half-smirked down at him, and didn't receive an answer. He was asleep, apparently. She would have mirrored his words from earlier if she'd been generally inclined to mirror somewhat questionable words, which she wasn't.

Usually.

"Hey, that's kinda sexy."

To her everlasting thankfulness, she didn't get a reply to that, either, and if he was awake, he sure as hell wasn't going to give it away.

* * *

End A/N: Look, I rotted your damned teeth for Valentine's day with sugary drivel to make up for this rather duct taped-together chapter. Ohoho, but if anyone thinks it's smooth sailing from here they are wrong! -cackles- If I play my cards right there may even be proper angst. PROPER ANGST! Maybe. Maybe some dark humor. I dunno if I can write angst without a bit of mocking. See I am not one of those special good angst-writers, so.

Okay. Also, please look at this. I. Hate. Making. OC's. And. Using. Them. In. My. Stories.

Seriously. No matter how interesting they are, people immediately take more kindly to an already-invented, familiar character. However, I have no idea what to use for a villain. Oh, yes, there are plenty to choose from, but it's a bit difficult what with the conflicting comic and cartoon timelines and the fact that I'm not overly knowledgeable in either. And, I can research a villain. And use them. But I'd rather try to make a good OC than portray a character wrong.

It also doesn't help that when I research, I get a bit confused by all the "So then he gets KILLED only he's not DEAD he's in a COMA until he's ASSASSINATED by his DEAD LOVER'S NEPHEW and then it turns out the NEPHEW is really his GRANDDAD'S MINIVAN from the FUTURE in an ALTERNATE UNIVERSE" stuff. So, although I may or may not listen to any one thing in particular, do you guys think that I should try to make a fun evil villain OC, or try to capture the character of an existing villain? You can make suggestions for existing villains if you want to see them, but I won't ask for them because I'll do authory work before I'll make my reviewers do it for me. This is a purely opinion-ish thing.

Review, and let me get me remaining 4 hours of sleep.


	5. Cannon Fire

A/N: So… guys. Uh. About that whole thing, you know, with the planning to update once a week and then the not updating for almost a yeAAAUUUUUGHHHH OH GOD NOT THE FACE. –mobbed to death-

I AM A TERRIBLE WRITER. I was all 'Oh yes I need a plot since my original one got shot to hell with continuity so I'll just wait for one to magically appear' and I got ZERO INSPIRATION. So I am going to pretend that I did and that I am a good writer with solid plots and stuff, and post this as your, er, religious/cultural holiday of choice present thingy. Happy/merry whatever! (No this is not a 'fishing for compliments tell me I'm a good writer' thing, this is an 'oh shit I need a plot I had better get my behind in gear if the next chapter can be action packed' thing)

And zomg, uber-thanks to everyone who sent me pokes. YOU MAKE ME FEEL SO GUILTY AND SQUISHY DAMN YOU ALL JUST READ THE CHAPTER.

* * *

Eventually, thanks to the lulling murmur of the television, the warm weight of her would-be enemy in her lap, and the fact that she couldn't reach the remote, Jinx fell asleep. 

Maybe in an alternate universe filled with overly romantic (perverted) plot bunnies, the two would have awoken, hours later, accidentally entangled in what could have passed for a lovers' embrace. This, of course, all happening conveniently between chapters, naturally occurring through perfectly average unconscious movement in which the both of them snuggled up as opposed to accidentally elbowing each other in the spleen due to the fact that they'd fallen asleep on a couch.

Jinx would ascend to the waking world slowly, languorously, to find herself strangely warm, and only then would she notice that she was not lying on a pillow, but rather a _person._ Kid Flash. Of course. Her alarm would be delayed by the hand scraping through her hair, darting down to press comfortingly at the nape of her neck and providing enough of a distraction for five temperamental clones of Jinx, much less just her. The other arm would be wrapped snugly around her, holding her to his toned chest that was suspiciously devoid of shirt.

She would look up in a total brain-dead state, her synapses not merely refusing to fire, but having gone on an expensive vacation to the Bahamas… right into his eyes. "G'morning, insert pet name of choice here," he would say in a deviously sexy sleep-roughened voice.

This hypothetical universe filled with overly romantic (perverted) plot bunnies was not the one Jinx woke up in. Unfortunately for her aching back, she was bent uncomfortably over the arm rest, lower half on the couch and upper half nearly falling off. Fortunately for her sanity, Kid Flash had fallen off the couch and didn't manage anything more coherent than "gggnnnggghhh" when she prodded him with a foot.

She sat up, trying to stretch out the kinks in her neck and shaking out her arm, which had fallen asleep. It tingled painfully, then started throbbing in tempo with her spine. Added to all that, she had a hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach- the remnant of some bad dream she'd been suffering through. What had it been about again? She remembered some vague notion of… bee people… and… an elephant that wanted to be… a coffee pot…? For some reason all of this had been terrifying at the time, particularly some idiocy about eyes and mind reading. That had been the most distressing part of the dream. She was also pretty sure she'd been eaten by a crocodile in a prom dress…

Huh. Ridiculous. The only scary thing here was her disillusioned mind that kept making her slog through these weird monstrosities that barely passed for dreams. And then, they weren't even _happy_ dreams.

In a particularly crappy mood, she glared around at the dim apartment, eyes adjusting quickly. The blinds were drawn over the windows, and the light shining from behind them was the light of Jump City, not daylight. It was the middle of the night. And she had woken up because of some stupid dream that she couldn't even remember?

Someone had to pay for this. Jinx did not _dream. _She was most certainly never frightened in her dreams. In fact… In fact, she was above dreaming. Therefore, she had to kill someone. It made perfect sense at… this time of the night… or… morning… whatever! _Misplaced aggression hooooo, _cried the evil little Vikings in her mind that'd given her the idea in the first place, shaking their miniature axes. But who'd given her enough strife to warrant such treatment?

A lot of people, come to think of it… But who was readily available?

Her predatory eyes settled on the unsuspecting Kid Flash.

She started off by poking him violently in the side. When this didn't work, she edged closer to the edge of the couch and leaned over as far as possible, before shouting, "OH NO WAKE UP THE NUNNERY'S UNDER ATTACK!" (Jinx was obviously a superb actress.)

"Wh- WHAT? Huh? What's- going- nuns on fire?!" Kid Flash replied most eloquently, waking up and trying to get up in his disoriented state. It took him a precious second to realize that the nunnery was most assuredly not under attack, though by then he had rolled under the coffee table. He sat up to glare at the culprit of the shouting only to fall to every person's secret weakness- not realizing there's something above them and thus hitting their head on the coffee table/ceiling/other person playing Twister. A pained mumble crawled out from under the coffee table and died as he let himself fall back down.

Jinx felt a slight twitch of regret- she hadn't thought he was going to be that effected by some random nonsense about a nunnery, or roll under and hit his head on the coffee table- but she quickly stifled it, like a smoker grinding their heel on the remains of their cigarette. After all, this was quickly helping her banish the hollow, shaky feeling that clung to her even in wakefulness. She was okay. She was okay. Nothing was going to eat her. She was still capable of acts of _unspeakable evil._

She buried her face in her hands, partially to relax herself further and partially to avoid looking at the fastest boy alive who had just lost a fight with a piece of common furniture.

"What was that for?" came the plaintive whine from a bedraggled Kid Flash, currently scooting out from under the coffee table and rubbing at his head groggily. Jinx peeked through the gaps in her fingers and found his eyes as impenetrable as ever, to her relief. It had just been a dream, she reminded herself. Eyes were _not _the portals to the soul. She could still read him otherwise, of course- looking at the appraising tilt to his chin, that familiar smile-masquerading-as-a-frown. But those eyes were just that, and as beautiful as they…

…

…

…

No.

_Geez, there's no point in rolling around on the floor and hitting my head on random inanimate objects if Jinx won't even crack a smile_, thought Kid Flash gloomily as he considered Jinx's face, carefully schooled to conceal all emotion. He hadn't been able to see her face a moment ago, but seeing as she'd been obscuring it with her hands there was obviously something wrong, and now she was trying to hide it. _Figures. Gotta get it out of her somehow._

In reality, that 'carefully schooled' expression was really just a lack of thought on Jinx's part as she completely stopped all further musings while her mental autopilot considered damage control.

Damage control turned out to be throwing a pillow at the resident speedster and convincing herself that she hadn't even been thinking about eyes in the first place.

The unfortunate resident speedster caught the pillow and fell backwards good-naturedly, looking up a moment later to arch his eyebrows at her. "You know, all that screaming is going to desensitize me."

She snorted at him, but he briefly glimpsed the reward of a quickly stifled half-smile. "Right, and the next time the nunnery will really be under attack and oh _no_, what will we do then."

Kid Flash wondered if all the sarcasm that dripped off of Jinx's half of the conversation was going to stain his sofa. "Hey, I'll have you know, attacking nunneries is… well… it's… it's serious business!" he informed her gravely, unable to come up with something suave at this time of the night. Or morning. Whatever it was- it was dark out. He allowed his head to flop back onto the carpet.

Silence descended, and Jinx stared off into nothingness, hiding a smirk with her hands. The television was a comfortable murmur in the background, but after a moment too many of no response, Kid Flash sat up and blinked at Jinx, who was still staring off into space… Wait, no, she was looking at something… Oooooooh… The TV… Riiiiight…

Kid Flash firmly maintained that he couldn't be expected to think coherently at whatever time this was.

He frowned and actually listened to whatever was on the TV for once. It sounded like a news channel, and the news anchor was blabbering on about some kind of museum robbing… _Wait- Aw, crap._

"…the necklace, rumored to bring good luck to whoever possesses it, was stolen from the museum some time Sunday afternoon. Police say that the alarm was most likely tripped on purpose as the culprit, or _culprits_, were leaving, or even set off through some sort of timed device, as there was no sign of a hasty exit. Even when visiting speedster, Kid Flash, was called in, there was no path for either detectives or the budding superhero to follow…"

He wasn't even that annoyed by the 'budding superhero' comment. He was just trying to find out if it was possible for him to suffocate himself with the sofa pillow Jinx had thrown at him. Signs pointed to 'no' but it was very self-satisfying to lie there with a pillow on his face, effectively blocking out the world.

"I'm going out," she said. It was all the incentive he needed to fling the pillow back onto the couch and stand up, alarmed, and zip over, standing between Jinx and the exit.

He immediately took a gallant, earnest approach to the whole thing. "I'll accompany you," He said, assuming a dramatic pose and running a hand through his disheveled hair roguishly.

Momentarily thrown off guard (did he have to go popping up all over the place, more specifically where she was trying to walk, the damned… uh… wow, she needed a thesaurus or something, she was running out of insults), it took Jinx an additional ¾ of a moment to roll her eyes and smack him on the shoulder before pushing past. "No, you're not coming with. Don't even try to argue. And if you do try to tag along, even if you think you're being careful about it and I don't know, I _will_ find out, I_ will_ find you, and I _will_ strangle you to death with a piece of piano wire."

Her irritated threat left hanging in the air (possibly suspended with piano wire that would be put to some future sinister use), Jinx strode through the mini dining room/kitchen and grabbed her coat, pulling up a chair to sit in while she put on her boots.

Kid Flash went through a mini panic attack while Jinx headed into the bathroom, to put on her old Jinx costume on under civilian attire. His thoughts once again began zooming about in general disarray. What was she going to do? Did she know who'd stolen the necklace? What if it was completely unrelated to her, and she just ended up involving herself unnecessarily or- even worse, got blamed for the whole thing? It would be hard enough to go good as it was, and what if this ended up complicating things? What if she'd decided that she didn't want to be good anyway and was about to disappear into the night? What if she joined the _circus?_

He was worried. It wasn't that he thought she was incapable. It was the fact that she _was_ so capable that was scary.

And now she was going out the door. It would sound stupid to ask. What was he even worrying for? Besides the point that she had suddenly just up and decided to leave. Crap, she was leaving- Time to screw his ego for a second and just ask. "You're… coming back, right?" he blurted, looking away when she stopped and glanced at him. That hadn't come out nonchalant at _all. _Maybe if he concentrated hard enough, he could give himself selective amnesia and then slowly convince himself that he had been perfectly suave. Suave like… like… a _suave _thing.

"If I was leaving, I would be bringing all my stuff with me," she responded dryly, inclining her head towards the messenger bag still in the apartment. Her eyes narrowed. "Speaking of which, stay out of the bag or you die. Lock the door after me, bye!" Pulling on her sunglasses and pretending that her last two sentences hadn't clashed horribly (they rhymed, too), she closed the door.

Kid Flash stared at the door for a moment as if it would suddenly proclaim itself to be king of the door people and give him all the answers he wanted, then quickly became sidetracked and wandered off to grab the hedgehog from its resting place and flop onto the couch with it. He remembered to lock the door first, of course. Not that he really needed to. "So… just you and me."

Predictably, the hedgehog just gave him an annoyed look and went back to sleep.

Kid Flash had to remind himself that this was a trust issue. If he didn't trust Jinx to do the right thing (with whatever she had left to do) then he'd have that much more trouble getting her to trust herself. To, er. Do good stuff. And… stuff.

He was certainly not cut out for coherent thought at whatever time it was. Picking up the remote, he started switching channels idly, his eyes unfocused and his mind preoccupied.

---

"I hate you Jump City, I hate you I hate you I hate you!" huffed Jinx under her breath, repeating it over and over again, a litany of sleep-deprived hatred. She repeated it even more fervently as she ducked into an alleyway and peeled off her outer layer of civilian clothing, stashing it in the oversized pockets of her coat.

Oversized they may be, but they still bulged oddly with the disguise she needed to exit the apartment building properly. How did the do-gooders handle all the excess clothing? Did they just… throw them out, or what? Her budget was certainly not good enough to afford throwing away clothes all the time. She'd need to come up with a better way to do this.

Groaning, she exited the alleyway on the other side, sans disguise, and didn't bother meandering aimlessly through the streets this time. It was freezing, she had a destination, and she had someplace to go back to- not a home, of course. Just a temporary place to stay. But hey, on the bright side, it wasn't a base!

Which was exactly where she had to go now. Jinx could ignore a great many things, a tolerance built from years of dealing with the same incompetent, loud team. There were just a few things that would register on her heightened radar, among them annoying, speedy do-gooders and news broadcasts about good-luck (myth, the good luck was just a _myth_) necklaces she'd tried to steal. True, the list was short and strangely specific, but it was just recently being populated, though that didn't make it any more bearable to deal with.

So here she was. HIVE five HQ. The first place she had to look. After all, the other members of the HIVE five were the only ones, besides Kid Flash of course, who knew about her attempted theft of the necklace. Maybe they had stolen it in an attempt to get her attention, upon finding her gone? It was almost… touching. Almost. But, considering she'd trekked across the streets (and rooftops) of Jump City to get here, it was mostly infuriating. And worthy of punishment.

They were asking for it, too. She could hear the sounds of explosions and gunfire coming distantly from the direction of the 'living room,' so to speak, which could only mean one thing.

Not fighting and explosions and gunfire in the base, of course. It meant a video game. Figured they were awake at this ungodly hour.

She followed the noise and, eventually, the dim, flickering lighting, and waited in the doorway to the all-purpose living room once the door slid open in front of her. She wasn't shocked that things were, more or less (leaning towards less) replaced and fixed up in this room- after all, the boys couldn't live without their TV or their games or their couches. Oh, no. But it was what they had _done_ with the couches and TV and games that was likely to stun anyone not used to the HIVE Five's crazed antics. As it was, even Jinx couldn't comprehend how it had come to this. _This can't be happening. I'm not seeing this._

She put her head in her hands and listened disbelievingly.

"I see you…" That was SeeMore. With his ridiculous eye references. "Mwahahaha!" And his maniacal laughter.

"So what? That gun's a hunk of scrap metal. You couldn't kill a fly with that thing, you dweeb." Gizmo. With his annoyingly high-pitched voice.

First-person shooter, she realized as the sounds of gunfire resumed. There were some gruesome fleshy sounds in with the mix. Like the pretzels in trail mix only bloodier.

"Gaaahh!" Gizmo had apparently died. At the hands of the piece of scrap metal that couldn't kill a fly. He lapsed into incoherent Gizmo-cursing.

"Hahahahaha! Can't kill anything, huh? Except you!" SeeMore found this terribly amusing, as evidenced by the frenzied laughter.

There was a crack as Gizmo threw his control on the ground in a fit of agitation. "That's not fair, my health was down already! That doesn't mean anything!"

Then their bickering became obscured by what sounded like canon fire. Deciding that she'd deluded herself long enough and she wasn't dreaming, Jinx looked up and tried to keep herself from making the whole base unstable with the bad luck escaping due to her irritation.

"Heh. Give up, Billy! Your boat's takin' on water!"

"Shut up, Billy, your defensive walls are down and you're goin' with 'em!"

"Hey! You guys knocked over my pie!"

Billy Numerous. Mammoth. Kid Wykkyd was just sitting in his own… boat silently and holding his own. All three were garbed in various pirate gear. Probably- no, definitely stolen.

'Boats,' they called them. Right. The HIVE Five couldn't just have couch forts, oh no. They had to put wheels and canons on the couch forts and call them boats. Which they weren't. They were _mobile couch forts._

This was probably Gizmo's doing. She'd never have allowed such idiocy if she was around. Which she hadn't been. Had they launched a search for her, gotten angry and gone for revenge, or even noticed she'd been gone? No. They'd just built themselves… couch forts.

With canons. That were firing throw pillows.

The noise was deafening up close. She didn't know what kind of canons Gizmo had made, but these didn't seem very trustworthy. They shook with each miniature explosion, and just discharging a pillow caused a noise that suggested far more dangerous projectiles than they were made for.

It was starting to get irritating. She wondered if she was going to go deaf as her ears were graced with another tremendous _boom_-

-and a pillow hit her square in the face.

There was an immediate marked pause in the nonsense as Billy, Kid Wykkyd and Mammoth looked at her in horror. They'd just fired a pillow-canon right at her! Not on purpose, of course, but Jinx did tend to end up getting hit by something in all the mayhem. Or tripping on something. Or falling on something… Or falling _into _something… And each time the result was the same: A massive explosion of death and misfortune as Jinx's thin patience snapped under the pressure of whatever projectile had been launched at her.

The pillow hung there on her face for a moment during the pause, before slowly peeling off and falling to the floor with an obstinate _plop. _It revealed a very hassled Jinx face, but not an apocalyptic rage Jinx face. This was a good sign. Mammoth knocked one of the Billy's out of his boat- couch fort, couch fort- and began to seek vengeance for his fallen pie. The nonsense resumed.

Jinx sighed and waltzed over to the one stationary couch where Gizmo and SeeMore had resumed trying to shoot each other to death. Another time, she might have marched in front of the TV, turned off the game (to their cries of dismay) to get their attention and demanded, loudly, what they had done with the good-luck necklace they had stolen and how a bunch of numbskulls like them had managed to rob a museum by themselves. But right now, she was just too… tired.

Instead, she stepped over the pillows and feathers littering the floor and came up behind the couch, leaning over and draping herself over her favorite armrest: one of her former teammates. Gizmo was too short, so she crossed her arms on top of SeeMore's head and rested her chin on top of them, watching the TV glumly.

Gizmo was oblivious to Jinx's presence, too focused on the game in front of him. SeeMore gulped, blushed furiously and started losing badly as his concentration flew out the window.

"You guys steal any good luck amulets lately?" she asked. It was too grim and exasperated to be a real question.

"What good luck amulet?" Gizmo frowned and stuck his tongue out in concentration as he lobbed a grenade and little pieces of SeeMore's character went splattering all over the walls of the game.

"The one from the museum?" SeeMore asked. At least he remembered it. There were signs of intelligent life! Kind of. "Nope, we haven't touched that museum since we got busted last time."

"Right. I didn't think so," replied Jinx with a sigh, dropping her hand to dangle limply by SeeMore's arm. He tensed and fidgeted uncomfortably. She didn't notice, though he'd taken note of her odd behavior. And she hadn't thought they had actually pulled off stealing such a thing, increasingly so after stepping in the room. All signs pointed to the HIVE Five as the only rational explanation, and of course the only rational explanation turned out to be wrong. "I'll be leaving now." She got up and put a hand on her back, trying to crack it. She felt like such an old lady.

"What, already? Aren't you gonna reveal your latest master plot or something?" Gizmo frowned further, though he may have just been concentrating on the game. SeeMore had started really playing again now that he didn't have such a distraction leaning on his head. She knew both of them were listening intently, though.

_Well. So they did notice I've been gone for the last week or so._

Of course they did. They just probably didn't know what to make of it. After all, why in the world would Jinx just up and leave? She stopped dead where she was, partially bent over, facing the ground and one arm on the couch. This was one of those issues that made her stop whatever she was doing and just freeze, motionless, wanting to go curl up in a corner somewhere and introduce her forehead to Mr. Wall, repeatedly. She wanted, so badly, to just make them_ listen_ for once so she could make them take care of themselves, if she couldn't take care of them. But what could she do in this situation? Crime was how they stayed alive. She was just worried that without her, they wouldn't stand a chance.

Hell, she'd been over this thousands of times when she was still their leader. Oftentimes when she'd just busted her ass to do something to make sure they didn't get arrested or ensure they had somewhere to steal dinner from and they replied with no gratitude whatsoever, she would let what could happen to them without her around swirl about in her brain like fine wine in a crystal glass, before taking a delectable sip of it. Because it was so obvious that they would just fall apart without her. She could barely keep up any semblance of order as it was, so what would they do if she stopped caring?

Crashing noises abounded and more canons went off in the background. The smell of singed upholstery followed a strange, warped sound. Sounded like one of them found a laser.

There was another problem. She still cared. Just… not in a way that would allow her to abandon all her dreams to essentially baby-sit a team who'd stopped trying. Sure, at the HIVE Academy they had been wonderful. Well-trained, highly organized, with Jinx, Mammoth and Gizmo at the top of their class- they knew what they were doing. But after Cyborg's betrayal and the collapse of the Academy, they'd lost a lot of their punch, and couldn't seem to motivate themselves. She supposed it wasn't all that surprising. The high school atmosphere might have encouraged them to apply themselves, brainwashing was a wonderful motivator, and Brother Blood had been quite generous with the things he promised people, the deals he made. She used to wonder what kind of things they had been promised, if they were promised anything at all. Not that it mattered back then, seeing as they used to listen to her. It mattered now. Maybe the end of the bargain they were supposed to get was so depressing to lose they couldn't handle it, and now…

Now she couldn't even hold any authority over them, except when she directly threatened physical and mental harm. Yet, even dealing with the horrible frustration of caring about people who didn't much care about themselves, she wanted to be assured that they'd be okay.

Despite the fact that they more or less treated her like crap on many occasions. Despite the fact that she wasn't their leader anymore, wasn't even on their side anymore. Despite that this felt like betrayal even if they hadn't done anything to keep her here, felt like she was just like... was doing exactly what Cyborg had done, while she was still trying to forget about that to keep herself from reliving how it felt, over and over and over. Even though she wanted to look out for their wellbeing exclusively, it seemed to be something that seemed less and less possible in her current situation.

_Eh, what the hell, _she thought with no small amount of bitterness. It had been a week and they weren't dead yet. Staying here and continuing with her depressing routine was not on her to-do list. She could just go on with life without them, and they'd have to do the same. She could cry and scream and rave all the way out the door, but that would only be her trying to distract herself from the feeling of being a complete turncoat, and a moron to boot. It wouldn't do anything.

In any case, it was about time they learned to take care of themselves.

"No," she said, finally remembering to respond. They had been sneaking glances at her since she stopped moving, and now she straightened, cracking her neck and holding it up high, though there was no real pride behind it. She rubbed her hand over Gizmo's head to his annoyed 'hey!!,' then turned around and stepped nimbly out of the way of a speeding couch fort slash pirate ship. "I've got other things to do. I probably won't be back."

"Whatever." Translation: Bullshit. Gizmo had reason to doubt, really. She hadn't even thought she'd be back here for anything after she said goodbye to Seemore. It had sounded so final, even she hadn't expected to see any of them like this again. Some things just weren't as serious as they were cracked up to be…

She shrugged as she headed towards the exit. "Suit yourself. There's no way I'm hanging around and cleaning up this mess."

"Do you mind? I'm trying to play a game here."

"Don't get yourself killed by a piece of scrap metal." She paused in the doorway once the door slid open, biting her lip. Gizmo was too immature, Mammoth didn't have the brains, Billy… also didn't have the brains, Kid Wykkyd was too quiet to be any sort of leader…

"SeeMore. Keep an eye on them."

She didn't get a response, but she knew she'd been heard. It was enough. The mantle was passed on. Too bad it didn't make her feel any less responsible for them. It still didn't feel like she had done enough.

She hesitated again. "I still have my communicator, if you guys need me." Too wimpy. "I'm looking for that necklace. I'll be around, so if you hear anything, give me a call, or I'll plague your lives with misery and woe." Better.

She watched them for a moment, realized nothing would likely ever be enough, and left anyway. The booming sounds of cannon fire followed her retreating footsteps, lingering, and echoed in her ears long after she should have been able to hear them.

---

_Well, if this isn't just really great. Really fricken' great. Just DANDY. _Jinx was slowly building her rage up to an apocalyptic level as she stomped back towards the apartment complex she was infesting. The worst part was that she _cared_ about all this, all this necklace and people nonsense. Caring was for heroes and care bears.

She was _not _a care bear.

Of course, the alternative involved brightly-colored spandex suits, self-righteous bullshit and puns so bad that the person saying them should be shot before the completed play-on-words left their lips.

…Maybe she could just be Grumpy Bear, and kick puppies when no one was looking.

Whatever. It was useless. She was no closer to a choice than she'd been the night she'd decided that if she was going to wallow in indecisiveness, she might as well do it in a warm place with a mug of cocoa in hand. All that she'd learned was that she just kind of wanted to be left _alone._ Not just by people, but by the entire life she'd led from the moment she was born with cat-slit eyes. As much as she'd deny it and hurt whoever had brought the subject up, she _liked _being Rebecca Reynolds, and she hadn't even been her for a day. The coffee-shop people _were _nice. Completely insane, but nice.

And she was ready to slap herself for even thinking it, but it felt satisfying to go and work for what she needed instead of taking it from people who probably deserved whatever it was more than her. At least she hadn't screwed that up yet, or had an attack of particularly vicious bad luck (Only her _enemies _were supposed to have it, but it never seemed to work out that way). Plus, being able to put aside the whole villain-hero-area in between thing made Wally West almost likeab-

No.

Maybe Rebecca Reynolds was not a good person to be. It was messing with her mind. On the other hand, she couldn't get a job or make normal friends as Jinx. She could live without the friends, but no job meant no money, which meant no getaway from Jump City.

Not that she couldn't have gotten out of the city right away. Oh, Jinx had a few connections. She could (try to) pull strings. She had willpower and skill to back it up. But none of those conditions would give her any kind of neutral ground… Any time to think about her decision.

So, go ahead and shoot her, she had crashed at Kid Flash's temporary Jump City apartment. She _could _spend miserable days trying to find her way while preoccupied with where she was going to sleep and what she was going to eat, but she _preferred _to be sensible. Practicality and independence weren't warring states. Besides, this way she had an impartial atmosphere in which to contemplate what the hell she had done, what the hell she was doing, and what the hell she was going to do. (Actually, that was a lie. Living with the most annoyingly self-righteous superidiots ever was not impartial. But she wanted to make Kid Flash's life miserable. A little pay-back. And what ended up happening? She watched TV and let him sleep on her lap. Jinx's plans never seemed to work.)

But back to the problem at hand. Good luck amulet missing. The one she tried to steal. Why did she have this stupid desire to find it- and if- when- she found it, would she give it back? No! Of course not! She would use it for her own selfish whims. Still, she had some nagging doubt in the back of her mind, wondering if it was better off in the museum. She'd probably just break it anyway. But why would she ever feel the slightest need to give it back if she found it? Hm. It was best not to wonder what her motives were. If she felt that they weren't embarrassing and wouldn't be held against her in a court of nagging-speedster, she would share them with herself. Until then, all she had was a hunch that this had to do with her. All of her senses were zeroing in on this weird little occurrence. Maybe she felt like if she tried out the hero thing, just for this little trinket, some great truth would be revealed to her. Maybe she'd figure something out. Maybe… maybe she could just find out who did it, get it back, give it back, and then she could have some peace.

Haha, right. And then she would buy a house with a picket fence and the Teen Titans would all come over with cake (hand baked by Robin), congratulating her on her work and welcoming her into the world of… of not being so… villainous. Kid Flash would announce himself as gay, breaking the hearts of fangirls everywhere, and continue to be a manwhore, only with a different gender. She herself would settle down with a pirate and have many little nestlings. She would get an average but interesting job at a big important-looking building, where she would engage in gossip and dirty jokes at the water cooler. On her sixty-fifth birthday all of the Titans in disguise and all her friends from her civilian identity would gather in her home and, surrounded by the laughter of children, she would blow out all the candles on her cake (hand baked, again, by Robin, who had discovered his true calling as a baker and who had painstakingly written 'Happy Birthday, with love from all of us!' on it in frosting. Only instead of 'love,' there was a little sugar-frosting heart.) in one breath.

She would then proceed to go into her room, pull out her handy-dandy happy-sixty-fifth birthday pistol and blow out her brains.

With her dying breaths she would try to wheeze out some kind of dramatic last words about switching her car insurance to Geico, but she would be struck by a sudden attack of Alzheimer's and just cough a few times before dying.

…Jinx had a theory. It involved snow being some kind of illegal inhalant, and the effects of this narcotic on her brain at… It had to be somewhere around 4 A.M. right about now.

Figuring that she couldn't get anywhere regarding stolen good-luck charms when she was this mind-addled, she scanned the block she was walking along and darted into a nearby alley. It was disguise time. She wondered, in her haze of sleep-deprived thought, if maybe trouble would stop following her if she spent more time pretending to be a civilian. Her mind danced around the fantasy gleefully, thinking of how wonderful it would be to have some peace, to be normal. The moments of distraction cost her.

When she looked up, Jinx caught just a glimpse of movement before a fist came flying towards her face. She caught it with both hands, momentarily unable to comprehend what was happening. By the time she caught her bearings it was too late to stop the other hand that smashed into her solar plexus. Pain embraced her like a long-lost friend and she doubled over, staggering backwards and just managing to stay on her feet. Instinct more than presence of mind compelled her to summon a rush of pink energy to her hands and send it crashing into the ground in front of her, concrete cracking and flying upwards in response.

_Never inviting Pain to my sixty-fifth birthday party again, _she thought furiously, still disoriented and trying to breathe again.

Dust from the fractured concrete obscured her vision, and she struggled to prepare herself. Her attacker could come at her at any moment. It was a shame there were no time-outs in alley brawls.

When a moment passed without any follow-up, Jinx tossed her coat to the side, clothes spilling out of its pockets as it hit the wall. No shadowy figure jumped out of the smoke to accost her at the movement, so Jinx stood her ground, flicking glances upward and then, as quickly as possible, over her shoulder, to make sure only one opponent was in sight.

After a few moments of the dust clearing, Jinx had begun to wonder if this had been some sort of bizarre hit-and-run, since no one was trying to throw anymore punches at her. Just when she was ready to go check on this, the dust cleared enough for her to realize that her attacker wasn't retreating- just aiming.

Her attacker was clothed in some kind of suit, and she quickly found out why. He had some sort of gun aimed at her, and when he could see her well enough, he pulled the trigger. Livid _flames_ erupted from the muzzle, and she flung herself against the wall.

"Who the hell are you?" she demanded, and shot a hex at the gun before ducking behind a dumpster. She snuck a quick glimpse at loves-matches-too-much-boy to see if the gun had been obliterated. No such luck.

Damn. Damn. She'd been waiting for a physical attack and prompting herself, not even thinking to take cover. Stupid. Where was her training?

"The name's Heatwave," he said. "And you have something that doesn't belong to you."

She heard approaching footsteps. "Well, gee, that could be a lot of things. Want to be a little more specific?"

"You know what I'm talking about. Where is it?" He asked, and swung around the side of the dumpster. He leveled his gun at empty air.

She jumped off the rim of the dumpster and planted solid kick right on his face. He crumpled and she began to use the momentum to flip over his head, but he caught her foot and dragged her to the ground.

They landed in a tangle of limbs and Jinx made a grab for the gun. She got the end of it jammed against her head instead. While she was lying belly-up and dazed, Heatwave stood up and aimed again.

"Gotcha," he said, and fired. She rolled over, barely avoiding the brunt of the flames and thusly being a human marshmallow.

As it was, heat seared across her side, and she gritted her teeth in fury as he prepared to blast her again. She braced her hands on the ground and kicked off, attempting to kick him in the face again. Her foot made contact with his hand instead, and the gun went skittering across the alley.

They paused for a moment, both caught by surprise. Then a mad scramble for the flamethrower ensued. When she took the lead, he jumped on her, and they rolled around on the ground for a minute, clawing at each other, before Jinx remembered- _duh, training, superpowers_- and rendered the gun useless with a hex.

"You little-" shrieked Heatwave, infuriated, and proceeded to tell her, in no uncertain and quite vulgar terms, exactly what she was. He got a hand free and grabbed at her hair.

Unfortunately for him, Jinx had had quite enough of this, and hexed him square in the gut. He went flying across the alley, hit the side of the dumpster, his eyes rolled into his head, and his unconscious form hit the ground. It was over as quickly as it had begun.

Jinx lay there for a moment before getting up slowly, waiting for some horrible pain, betraying a broken bone. But nothing was in more than an average amount of pain, so she staggered over to her clothes, tugged them on over her singed attire, and wondered what to do with Mr. Unconscious. She had no idea _why _he'd attacked her, and didn't feel like tying him up and interrogating him. She was so _tired._

Hmm… But what if he was hurt? Sure, he had attacked her, but she should still make sure he was okay. Check his body for injuries and treat his wounds. And if he was a bad guy, she could bring him to the police!

Heh, heh, heh.

Bending over, she checked him for belongings, found a card with some weird symbol on it, and stowed it in a pocket. As an afterthought she checked for a pulse. Yup, nothing to worry about. After a moment of surveying him with hands on hips, she decided she couldn't just leave him in the middle of the alley. She bent over again, and this time hefted his body up… and tossed it into the dumpster. There. She was a regular freaking saint. Eat your heart out, Kid Flash.

Jinx left the alley and attempted, once again, to find her way back to her current residence without getting accosted. Oooh, these were going to be some nice bruises… Well, on the bright side of all this, she was mostly sure that Kid Flash hadn't followed her- after all, she didn't go to HIVE Academy to learn about sunshine and daisies, and there had been none of the telltale signs of being watched by someone with _way_ too much time on their hands.

Besides, she highly doubted that he'd let her get jumped in an alley without making an appearance. It was a good thing, too. Getting caught completely off guard and catching a hit in the gut right off was embarrassing enough without having someone you know witness it or, worse, that someone being a dolt who wouldn't hesitate to intervene.

She pondered the results of this once she finally reached the building. She was in her civilian clothes, albeit dirty, wet, and ragged civilian clothes, but she didn't have her sunglasses… She could pass her eyes off as colored contacts, but didn't want to spend the time pretending to anyone who asked. She went around back and started trying doors at random, before someone opened a door to a stairwell and threw out some garbage. She waited for them to leave before unlocking the door with a hex and stepping inside, stomping her boots to rid them of snow before climbing the stairs.

Once she was on the correct floor, she decided that if the Kid Flash interference actually happened, she had no doubt that the pyromaniac would go home and laugh later (or right then and there) if they knew what kind of company an ambitious ne'er-do-well such as Jinx was keeping. It was like a friend from another social circle introducing themselves to a different group of friends and doing an embarrassing job of it. She winced at the mental image.

Shaking her head and seeing how many times her neck could crack in one roll of her head (it was a uber-fun new game she'd just invented on the way to the right apartment), Jinx tried the door before hexing the lock again. She opened it more through leaning against it than actually walking forward, and almost forgot to shut it behind her. The apartment was empty. She nearly cried with relief. Kid Flash- absent. This was a blessing. He had probably gotten some sort of call and was off pestering some criminals instead of her. And the pestering he would bestow upon her for walking in looking like she'd been hit by several cars and then run over by a train might just kill her.

Aching hands grabbed for her beloved life-in-a-messenger-bag and numb legs dragged her aching body into the bathroom. Screw this not being her apartment. Screw the possibility of having her solitude time interrupted. She wanted a bath and dammit she was going to take one.

While the bath was filling up with scorching water, she took a moment to browse the products of an apparent Bath & Body Works closet shopper. Really, she had to find out why Wally had this assortment of scented crap. If anything it would be fun to watch him squirm.

They all seemed unused though… and it was such a shame to have a bath without bubbles…

Shifty-eyed and feeling like there was a telescreen in the bathroom, she furtively sorted through the mess to find something to actually clean herself with. She had been thrown about a dingy slush-filled alley. Water alone was just not going to cut it. Of course, she was trying to find the least scented, most unobtrusive product she could find. This meant that Curious (Britney Spears) was out of the question.

Oh wait, second guessing herself here! Intensely floral, feminine blend of fragrant blooms in Louisiana magnolia touched with Golden Anjou pear and dewy lotus flower? Sounds _fabulous!_

Heh. She'd use her happy sixty fifth birthday pistol decades early before it came to that. Or, more simply, just screw soap and shampoo, and just scorch off the top layer of her skin.

_Oh- Wait, wait. No way. A Fresh Cut Roses set._

_Ha. Ha. Hahahahahaha._

What the heck, she was in the mood for irony. Snagging the packaging (bubble bath, shower gel, shampoo and conditioner all in one, oh good golly gee) and ripping it open like the belly of a gazelle, she poured some of the bubble bath into the tub just as it finished filling.

Jinx retired sans disgusting clothes into the bath, and settled down to get the muck out of her hair and read a sappy romance novel. She'd heard somewhere that this was supposed to be relaxing.

…Okay, so it was a horror novel. She was taking a _bubble bath._ That was quite enough of her recommended dose of 'trying new things' for now.

Unfortunately, after only five minutes of trying to relax, she had nearly dropped the book into the water, bumped her head on the wall behind her, relinquished a shampoo bottle to the bubbly water, and lost most of her eyesight from soap in her eyes anyway. Besides that, the simulated smell of roses had turned out to be much stronger than she would have liked. It clogged the air with fake, sickly sweetness and she was going to gag if it didn't dissipate soon. Plus, bath products hurt burn wounds, _a lot._

Miserably cursing bathrooms everywhere, Jinx drained the bath and took a seven-minute damned lukewarm _shower._

Well, that hadn't accomplished anything. Her back was just as sore as before, her neck was still stiff, she needed to bandage up that burn, and now she smelled like… like bath products. Bath products! She took some of her anger out by staging a dramatic play involving a loofah and a bar of soap, pleading for its soapy, humble home.

"Master Loofah! Please have mercy on my bubble village! We have paid your toll and barely have enough food left to stay alive! –Foolish peasant, you DARE to question the almighty Loofah, Master of the Universe? For this you will PERISH! …PAINFULLY! –OH GOD, PLEASE NO! NOO! MY SOFT ORGANS AND INSIDES!"

"Jinx? Is that you in there?"

"NO!" She answered automatically, starting and dropping the soap. She swore and realized that, yet _again_, Kid Flash had caught her off-guard. As per usual all she could do was get irritated and retaliate. "No," she repeated vehemently, trying to resist the urge to flip him off even though he couldn't see her. "It's not. This is the _Godfather_. I was just walking by at five in the morning and I figured, like, hey, I'll go to my old buddy Wally's house and use his _shower!_ Hope you don't mind."

"Hey! Of course I don't mind. What've you been up to these last few months?" He was purposefully mistaking her sarcasm as an invitation to play along, and he was way too cheerful about it. Maybe he'd gotten into the cabinets and eaten a packet of sugar or something.

"Oh, you know. The usual. Conspiracies. Killing people. Sitting in a chair." Really, she wouldn't usually resort to such terrible conversations, but she was too exhausted and high-strung to care. Her shower-time was probably going to be encroached on now, so there was no point in continuing and expecting some relaxation. She turned it off and stepped out, grabbing a towel before rummaging in her bag.

"That's cool. So, have you seen my friend Jinx around here, by any chance?" His smirk practically phased through the door and hovered about her like a noxious vapor, and she had the feeling she was supposed to protest at something in that sentence, but she couldn't figure out what. "She's about my height, pink hair, pink eyes, sweetest gal you could ever meet and also possibly carrying a butcher knife."

She coughed to cover her snicker and found what she was looking for: the calling card, so to speak, that she'd taken from Heatwave while he was- ahem- sleeping. "Oh yeah, her. Sorry, she owed me some money and I had to shoot her. If you want her body, it's in the trunk of my car."

She blocked out his protest of "Don't joke like that." to slide the card under the door. "Look, just find out what that card stands for or who it belongs to."

"Wouldn't you rather put me to better use? Like, say… washing your back?"

"I will _kill _you."

"Right, right! Going!"

In the wake of the sound of his retreat, she sighed and inspected her various forming bruises. They weren't anywhere visible in winter-wear, at least. Out of sight, out of mind, right…? A dry chuckle escaped and bounced around the bathroom. Wouldn't that be nice.

Scant minutes later, Jinx strolled out of the bathroom, still very sore and too exhausted to be irritable. Mostly. She tossed the messenger bag and the dirty clothes into a corner. She'd deal with it later. Zombie-like ambling brought her to the couch. It was folded up. It was not a bed.

Jinx was sorely tempted to just lie down on the floor, but she knew her spine would dump loads of hate on her tomorrow morning if she did. With a mighty burst of energy, she tossed the cushions off and unfolded it, the bed just locking in place as she collapsed on it, face-forward. She didn't move to turn off any lights or crawl under the covers. She didn't care that her hair was still wet and her ears were numb. She had bathed- showered- whatever, and changed into a nightshirt and demonic pants (They'd been just gray sweats originally, but she had drawn little knives and scythes and maces all over them with a fabric marker). That was all her body was allowing her.

Her eyes had barely closed when Jinx heard the telltale sound of super-speed, and Kid Flash was back in the apartment. She didn't bother looking up. "Find anything?" she asked, the question muffled and partially lost in the sheets.

"Not yet. I left it back in Central City. The super-computer can figure it out better than I can, though it will take a while, so I just came back here. I can pick up the results later."

A while could have meant a few hours or a few minutes. She didn't ask. "Mmmk."

Kid Flash continued to grin in a silly manner, very gad she couldn't see him. She was wearing cute pajamas again. Remembering himself, he zipped to the bathroom and retrieved a clean towel. "Here, at least lay your head on this and get under the covers. Don't want you catching a cold."

She had enough energy to make a rude gesture at him.

"That was uncalled for," he pouted. A pause, a stroke of genius. Diabolical genius. "If you don't want to do that, I'll just have to tuck you in and sleep on the pullout bed with you… For warmth, of course."

Her head slowly turned until a burning gaze was fixed on him. Tyrants and kings would have cowered under her glare. "If you want to do _that_, I'll just have to gouge out your eyes and then choke you with them. For your own good, of course."

"Well, if I have to go…" he said, walking closer and looking as if he had every intention of committing indirect suicide.

"Nngh! Fine, fine. I'm going. I'm up… I'm up…" With great effort, she lifted herself partially. Fell down again. "I'm down. Screw this, I'm going to sleep."

"Not just yet. Here, let me-"

She made an irritated noise at him. "No."

"Come on, you're being ridiculous."

"Dear kettle, you are black. Love pot."

He rubbed at his temples "Here. Look," he said, placing the towel on the pillow and pulling the blankets down as far as he could with Jinx lying on them. "All you have to do is get up there, and I'll leave you alone."

"Forever?" she asked wistfully.

"For a few hours."

"For twelve hours," she argued, employing a crawling motion to scoot up on the bed and managing to pull the blankets over herself. "There. Happy?"

"Well, it would help if I could get a goodnight kiss… Kidding! Kidding," he interrupted himself at her intensified glare.

She didn't reply. Sleep had already crept up and crashed over her.

* * *

End A/N: Yeah, the whole falling-asleep chapter break is so incredibly cheap, but it's honestly the best place to end it. I also apologize for that abortion of a fight scene. I'll do better next time, I promise, just don't use the cane. D': 

So uh. I have a great plot planned guys. Outlines and diagrams and graphs and everything. Serious business here. I'm talking Microsoft Excel. Men in suits and ties were called on cell phones. Important calls. About plot. IMPORTANT PHONE CALLS TO IMPORTANT PEOPLE IN TIES AND SUITS AND SHOES. I AM SO TOTALLY PREPARED FOR THE NEXT CHAPTER. /lies And yeah, Heatwave? I just magically plucked him out of somewhere. I was like, 'I want a villain with a flamethrower,' and boom there he was. I didn't make him up; he does exist, but his suit is made out of asbestos, and I'm preeeeetty sure that's poisonous. MORE HOLES SHHHH WE'LL LEAVE IT OUT OF THE DIAGRAMS.

This is unedited. More apologies. Review if you want to make me feel guilty for being so unreliable when I have such freaking amazing readers and reviewers. I read them all (ALMOST 100 HOLY POTATOES YOU CRAZY AWESOME PEOPLE), and after this gets posted I'll go around and reply with answers to every review with a question in it that needs to be answered. ;;


	6. It Gets Ugly

A/N: Okay, so I'm a filthy liar, there were no men in suits with ties, but I'm trying nonetheless. For starters I made some better notes about the characters, because I'm trying to get a handle on Jinx and Kid Flash. It's easy when they're your brain-children all hangin' out at your mind-bars, but these two haven't completely materialized to the point where I know what they'd do in a situation, and I felt sometimes I deviated from character for the sake of humor, which isn't OK.

I HAVE been researching on wiki and Titans Tower and etc., Scarlet Witch for powers (though that chaos stuff is right out and I'm too mean to ever give Jinx the ability to have good luck powers later on, especially since that's not really described well), Jinx for background (Yes I know her name isn't Indian, we've already established that I'll change the season on a lark so naming stood no chance, and that name just bam popped up there. I'm working on her original name.), Kid Flash for background and a bit of future stuff in case of a (gasp) sequel.

I'm also going to hold off on introducing too much cultural stuff until I do more research. It didn't show up in the episodes, so I can safely assume that it won't have a _gigantic_ affect on everything Jinx does. That's good for now, because all I remember from studying various religions in the past is the Qur'an song, and the Qur'an doesn't even have anything to do with Hinduism (which I assume is what Jinx is, since according to wiki it dominates something like 80 of India). Gah, I'm hopeless. Let's get this train wreck over! WARNING: There's a bit of swearing through this chapter, and one f-bomb a the end. I'm not going to change the rating just for that (if anything, I'll go by a rating-by-chapter system that I've seen employed before and that seems to work) and I doubt anyone will go 'Omg my virgin eyes!' right now on the spot and close the window, but it's my prerogative to warn you. The other warning is that this is unedited. I wanted to post it as soon as possible.

Onward!

* * *

What Jinx hadn't thought about last night when she collapsed into bed was the fact that she had a job now. She had to go to work. The coffee shop opened at eight thirty on Sundays, and Jinx didn't want to be late. That didn't seem so important when her internal clock woke her up two hours after she fell asleep.

For a moment, in fact, she stared with aching eyes up at the ceiling, completely refusing to believe that it was Sunday morning. That hadn't felt like sleeping. That felt like she'd blinked and it was time to get up again.

_It's not true. This isn't happening._

She rolled over and caught an eyeful of the clock on the DVD player. It was only six. She wasn't going to be able to get back to sleep. This _was_ happening. She was not happy. The warm covers were very, very nice, and the apartment was very, very cold. However, a restlessness set deep in her gut forced her to get up and go to get her messenger bag.

It was this same restlessness that had forced her to wake up in the first place. Jinx did not do well with alarms, so she had to program herself to wake up early. If not for that antsy feeling that told her that she was going to miss something important if she didn't haul her ass out of bed, she'd never be able to get up in the morning, because Jinx was not a morning person at heart.

Before she got the hang of waking herself up in the morning, Jinx went through alarms like other people went through paper. Jinx did not like being woken up by a beeping thing in the morning. Jinx had a very short temper. When Jinx was woken up by something other than her own willpower in the morning, Jinx tended to forget that she had to get up to actually do something at a certain time. Her objectives narrowed down to stopping the noise and going back to sleep. So, it followed that in her irritation, her alarm clocks tended to… explode.

Explode might have been a strong word for it, but the fact was, Jinx got angry, she focused all her attention on how angry she was at the damn alarm clock, and later, when she woke up, late for whatever heist or surveillance or research she'd been planning, there were the sad remains of her alarm clock strewed across her room. Killed in the line of duty.

So, when Kid Flash- _In civilian clothes. Wally,_ Jinx thought, but it was hard to hold both Kid Flash and Wally West in her brain and assign a name to this one- strolled in the door holding a breakfast bag and looking way, WAY too cheerful for six in the morning, Jinx was awake and grabbing her bag and considering throwing it at him.

"Don't look at me," she said, rubbing at an eye. She was really exhausted and she probably looked like hell. Not that she cared what she looked like. Or if he saw her looking like crap. It was just that she had a reputation to uphold, that's all.

He ignored her and looked anyway.

He hadn't paid much attention to it yesterday, but it was interesting to see Jinx unprepared to face the world. Her hair reached slightly past her shoulders when left down, although it was hard to tell, since it was more in the mood to go all over the place than obey gravity- not that it usually did. The pink patches on her cheeks were gone, washed away, as was the mascara. Her eyelashes matched her eyes and hair.

He thought it was really, really cute, except he shouldn't say anything about it because he knew she'd probably get angry and hit him. And if he dodged, she'd find some other way to get even, so it was probably better to just avoid irritating her. Maybe. Even if it was lots of fun.

Then his thoughts drifted off towards what else might fit the pink color scheme. He went into the kitchen, set his breakfast down, and tried sticking his head in the refrigerator. No use. Mental tracks clogged up with smut. Train of thought stuck. Not really that bad of a situation but he was going to need a cold shower if he couldn't pull his mind out of the gutter.

Jinx missed this display because she had already barricaded herself into the bathroom. She stared at her reflection. _Yikes,_ she thought. She really looked like she had had a rough night. And she didn't have to be at work until eight thirty, but she knew if she went back to the warm bed now it was all over.

She ran into a problem when trying to remove her shirt. The burn wound wasn't that bad, just a bit of missing skin off the top (well, okay, a lot of missing skin off the top) and a terrible stinging sensation, but it was healing. It was filled with disgusting yellowish goop that probably meant it was healing, anyway. Unfortunately the goop had appeared while she slept, and pressed into her nightshirt. When she finally got the sticky wound free from the fabric she just barely stifled a yelp of pain. That wouldn't do. Snooping through Kid Flash's closet yielded big bandaging pads and bandaging tape. She took care of that and looked for any other wound that needed tending to, and found none.

So she shimmied into jeans, a stretchy black v-neck T-shirt, and a pair of pink Vans- the only other shoes she had besides her boots. Usually Jinx was stylish. Jinx had style. Jinx had chutzpah. Jinx could rob any clothing store she wanted. But today she was too drained to put too much effort into her appearance. She also hadn't brought a lot of clothes from HQ when she snuck in and grabbed her stuff, for mobility, practicality and morality reasons. And she didn't have much money, because she hadn't brought a lot of that either. The Five needed it more than her. Maybe when she got a paycheck she'd shop first and pay Kid Flash rent later. It wasn't like she wouldn't jump at the chance to inconvenience him.

Still, a lacking wardrobe didn't seem to be an adequate excuse, so she set about trying to compensate for it. She applied the pink coloration to her cheeks (she felt completely disgusting, like a corpse, otherwise, and pink was her thing), some pink to her lips for fun, and the mascara to her eyes, then studied herself. She'd pulled her hair back and pinned it up with a black clip that looked like it would make a good murder weapon and done the makeup thing. Her sunglasses were broken, but she could get new ones. What else was missing?

Twenty minutes later Jinx burst out of the bathroom, fiercely triumphant. She noticed the hedgehog curled up in her rumpled sheets, scooped him up, and carried him into the kitchen. Wally was there, leaning against a counter and drinking something out of a mug. Probably something healthy. Freaking morning people.

He held out a plate of bacon, and she shook her head.

"Vegetarian," she said, and he filed it away for future knowledge. She put down the hedgehog and rustled around in the cabinets. The one thing that was good about living with someone who could probably eat birthday cake for the rest of his life and not gain an ounce of fat was that he always had plenty of junk food.

She grabbed a box of Frosted Flakes, figuring she was doing a service to the city by making sure that much less sugar went into the speedster's diet, and rustled around some more until she found the bowls. She located the spoons and the milk, and ate breakfast sitting on the counter opposite from Wally. He watched her over the mug, steam rising from it.

"Grocery shopping must be a nightmare," she said. She didn't even want to think about how much food the guy must go through in a day.

His eyes crinkled and she knew he was smiling behind the mug. "It's price I pay for being a hero."

_There's more you pay than just an abnormally high grocery bill,_ she thought, but just got up to wash her bowl.

She blinked, and when she opened her eyes, the bowl and spoon were out of her hands and back in their places, probably washed. She started, her brain taking a moment to process the fact that she wasn't holding her dishes anymore. _Oh, sure._ _Use your superpowers at six thirty in the morning. Give me a heart attack, _she thought.

Wally was, of course, leaning against the counter, looking like he'd never moved. He had put his mug away, too, and she could see the smile now.

"Are you always going to do that?" she asked, hand on her hip.

"Only if I have a wet rag handy. It takes too long for the water to get out of the faucet and onto the dishes."

What was her life reduced to that she could hear something like that and know he wasn't joking? What the hell was she doing, that she was in a hero's place and getting ready to go to a perfectly respectable job? More importantly, was there a sunglasses place open this early?

Then she remembered what she had thought of last time immediately following thoughts of sunglasses, and almost perked up, which was frightening. If Jinx was perky she was probably planning something. "Notice anything different this morning?" she asked sweetly.

He broke out into an instinctual cold sweat. It didn't matter if he was observant when it came to her. That was one of The Questions. Those questions were meant to frighten their prey and send them into full mental shutdown. As it was, his mind had deserted him and was drawing a complete blank, except for a sense of dread.

She gave a bark of laughter at his horrified expression. She was joking around, and had chosen that question on purpose. Man, she had to do that more often. "Eyebrows," she said, tapping her forehead but careful not to smudge the lines she'd drawn on with eyeliner. It had taken a while to get them to be the right shape and thickness. Luckily, she was an artist. And she was pretty stoked about this. She'd never had an occasion to give herself eyebrows before, besides trying it in private.

"Oh," he said, lifting an eyebrow of his own. A natural eyebrow. Showoff. "You sure that's it? You look like a cat that found a creamery." His thoughts would have detoured into muddy waters again, but she responded.

Jinx had to admit, she was slightly miffed. "What do you mean, 'that's it'? Of course it is! Eyebrows are a big deal. I am usually eyebrow deprived."

"I'd be more worried about jacket deprived," he said. Her eyes were narrowed and her lips were pressed tight together. Her arms were crossed. The eyebrows were definitely unnecessary, but a coat wasn't. Was she really going to go outside in just jeans and a T-shirt?

"Well, gee, sorry Mom," she said. So much for her fun. Some people just didn't understand hardship. Her tone colored with a bit more sarcastic vexation, and she started to gesture with her words. She was detouring from the subject of coats, because her coat was filthy with alley junk and she didn't want to explain it and if the conversation continued this way she'd end up wearing one of his jackets. "You just don't understand. You've never been eyebrow-less. I should shave off your eyebrows in your sleep."

He put his hands over his eyebrows protectively. "You wouldn't!" She would. They both knew it. New approach. "I'd have to take you to court for that."

She exhaled disbelievingly and rolled her eyes. "Sure. I rob a museum and you just want to talk. I threaten your eyebrows and you're all ready to send me to jail." The eyes grew sharp and challenging. "And I'd make it look like an accident."

He lowered his eyelids and looked at her from under his eyelashes, crossing his arms. Frustratingly, confidently dubious. "You'd make shaving off my eyebrows in my sleep look like an accident." Not really a question. Incredulous tone.

She turned around and went to go get her bag in preparation for sunglasses hunting. "Yeah," she said, not able to help a little swing in her step and a smug grin tugging at her lips as she faced him again, bag over her shoulder. "Can't you hear the papers? Kid Flash! Fastest boy alive! Ran so fast his eyebrows peeled off! Soon to follow: his dignity!"

He pushed off the counter, walked toward her and matched the grin. His tone was low. "Think you could pull it off without waking me up?"

She edged forward, almost nose-to-nose with him, eyes narrowed, and poked him firmly in the chest. "Think you could stop me?"

He nearly closed the gap and she nearly turned around and ran. She was shorter than him without her boots on, so he angled his head down to look at her and she had to lift her chin. He leaned down. His eyes were dark and his lips almost brushed hers when he spoke. There was only a breath of air between them. Jinx was pretty sure she stopped breathing. She was also pretty sure her heart stopped beating. Her brain had certainly stopped _thinking._ "Yes," he said.

Then her world blurred and when her eyes and her mind caught up again, she was wearing the sweatshirt he'd been wearing not even a second ago, her hair was falling out of its clip, and freaking Wally was looking disgustingly smug, taking in her disheveled appearance. He watched shock dance across her face, followed quickly by outrage, laughed, and then she was alone in the apartment. He definitely cheated and used super speed, and she knew he would be in his uniform and long gone by the time she even got to the door.

Her infuriated gaze was fixed on the empty space in front of her. "Effing impossible!" she shrieked. What she was thinking was _Effing tease, _but she wasn't even going to _go _there.

She looked down. There was a rose stuffed down the sweatshirt, bloom caught above her collar and stem resting against her chest, on top of the T-shirt.

The sweatshirt came off, hit the ground with enough force that it almost yelled out in pain even though it was an inanimate object and didn't even have a mouth, and was hexed across the floor. She hexed it again, and it jumped into the air. Twice again. The sweatshirt was now an ex-sweatshirt. There was no way in hell she would wear it, even if it was somehow whole again and not in ragged pieces all over the floor. Even if someone paid her. Even if it was still warm and smelled really nice.

Next she grabbed the rose from where it had fallen on the floor and marched to the sink. She ran the water and switched the garbage disposal on. It rumbled to life and she got ready to feed the rose down the drain, stem first.

Nothing. Her arm wouldn't move.

She gritted her teeth and tried again.

Nope. Her arm shook a bit. She still couldn't do it.

Jinx turned the disposal off, now not only furious at her roommate but disgusted with herself. She could barely throw away dead flowers. She had an even harder time getting rid of new ones, when they were all pretty and fresh and hopeful. It was weird, because no matter how unromantic or jaded she could be, or how tomboyish she could get despite her dress sense, one of her few girlish traits was that she loved flowers. She didn't _want _to love them. She just did. She would be a liar if she told anyone she threw away all the flowers Kid Flash left her, because they were drying, pressed in between the pages of her sketchbook. She _was _a liar and would tell anyone she threw them away, but she knew the truth, and it rankled.

Of course, she'd destroyed the first flower Kid Flash gave her, but she had been suffering from wounded pride and a burning desire for revenge at the time. She was pissed at him now, too, but she'd worked off some of her anger by destroying the sweater. And something about flowers always made her goofy.

She tucked the rose into the pocket of her jeans, bloom sticking out just above the top, because if Kid Flash saw it in the apartment he would be even more insufferable than he already was. She also let down her hair and wore the striped witch hat, pulled down so far that she almost couldn't see. It was necessary, however. Passersby would think she had colored contacts if they noticed anything awry, but when she got to the shop her co-workers would be close enough to notice that they were Jinx's eyes. She didn't know who knew she existed, or what she looked like. After all, she wasn't exactly a big-news villain, to her chagrin. But she couldn't take the chance. The hat would be pulled all the way over her face if she had to do it, which she probably would since shops generally weren't open at seven on Sundays.

Hat in place, Jinx walked through the door and closed it behind her. She wanted to lock it but she didn't have a key, and Wally would likely drop in during the day anyway. She walked down the hall and took the elevator, garnering a few odd looks from the few people who were around this early on her way out. It was probably the hat. It just screamed 'Oh those crazy teenagers.'

When she stepped out onto the street, she immediately wished she had stolen a jacket from Wally before she left. It was FREEZING out. She was going to have to amputate an arm by the time she got to the coffee shop. For a moment, she danced in place, rubbing her arms and considering running back upstairs. All she had in her messenger bag was her sketchbook and her Jinx outfit, and neither one was an option for warmth. Finally she remembered how smug and evil Kid Flash was earlier, and how she wanted to lean into him and then he tugged a damn sweatshirt over her. Her stubbornness dug its heels in and she took off toward the shop at a trot. Screw the cold. She had dealt with cold Jump City before. She could do it again.

About three fourths of the way to the coffee shop, Jinx was having second thoughts. She was seriously considering knocking someone on the street down and stealing their winter clothes. She had run all the way so far, so that kept her marginally warm for long enough, but now she was tiring and slowing down. Her breath was slightly erratic and showed white in the cold. When she got tired and slowed down the cold crept up on her again. Worse, she ran by a glasses shop when she forgot the way a while back and sidetracked a bit, and it had been closed.

Her trot melded into a fast walk. A smartly-dressed, redheaded woman was approaching, walking in the opposite direction on Jinx's left. The woman had a purse thrown over her left shoulder, and a pair of sunglasses were poking out of it. Jinx wrestled with indecision. She was approaching the woman too fast for her to think as much as she wanted to, and to slow down would be suspicious. When they were side-to-side Jinx bit the bullet, reached out and slipped the sunglasses out of the woman's purse and into the crook of her arms. The woman walked on, not even noticing any disturbance.

Jinx felt only a twinge of guilt as she slid the sunglasses on. Usually she didn't feel even that. But in this case, she figured she was at least slightly justified. It wasn't as if there were any shops open. And if someone somehow recognized her eyes, she would have to scram and say goodbye to her job and paycheck.

She broke into a trot again, and estimated once she pulled up to her place of employment that it was around five after eight. The shop was dark and locked. She could hex the lock, but someone might see and she would need to explain how she got inside. She walked in place, arms crossed tightly across her stomach to hold in any warmth.

After five minutes Jinx was ready to just break in and lie her ass off, when the lights switched on and Sam approached from inside the store. Sam was color coordinated today: her skin, her hair, her eyes, her makeup, and her clothes were all varying shades of brown. It made Jinx think of chocolate, because she'd only had sugary cereal this morning and she had a daily chocolate intake quotient she needed to fill.

Sam unlocked the door and Jinx rushed in, shaking out her hands and trying to rub some warmth back into herself.

"Rebecca! _Je_-sus! What the hell were you doin' out there? You're lucky I looked out my window, because you look like you'd need de-thawing if I left you out there any longer," said Sam. She closed and locked the door again.

Jinx was glad that Sam had come from inside the store and addressed her directly, because otherwise she would have been all 'who, me?' She had completely forgotten that she went by a new name now, and 'Rebecca' sounded nothing like her. Her fast tongue was pretty good when she needed to lie and sprouted off whatever came to her mind first, but when those lies had consequences she started to wish she thought things through more. Her painted eyebrows were drawn together, first from the name and then from the mention of a window.

"I live over the shop," Sam explained, seeing Jinx's puzzled expression. "Good thing I do, because I open on the dot and everyone else is always late. What're you thinkin', goin' around without a coat in the middle of winter? I'll grab you something from upstairs. You make yourself comfortable." She opened a section of the counter, stepped through and left via the kitchen. Jinx supposed there was a set of stairs somewhere back there that led to the building above.

She was slightly surprised to learn that everyone else was late every day. Sam was a motherly type, but she also seemed the sort that employed tough love and was firm about rules and timing, so Jinx had to wonder if Sam owned the shop. Jinx always assumed she did, but she couldn't help think that Sam would be more strict about showing up on time if she owned the place.

Furthermore, Jinx's hiring yesterday had been outrageously lax. A Sam who stood to lose the place if she broke the law would probably have been, well… more legal. After Wally left, they got her name, confirmed that she was sixteen, taught her about running the register and the coffee machines and cleaning the kitchen and bathroom, and she was employed. She was pretty sure that she should have needed to present some sort of legal documents or an ID (things she didn't have), but nothing of the sort was demanded of her. She couldn't help but wonder if Wally had said something.

The thought made her heart constrict a bit. That was really nice, damn him. It usually frustrated her when he was nice, because she didn't know what to make of it. But now there was a bit of something like gratitude mixed with the frustration.

Then she realized he must have pushed her buttons and then led her to the shop on purpose the other day, knowing she would take the job, to have talked to these specific people.

Now she was just frustrated again.

Sam walked back out of the kitchen, holding a big… puffy… pink… coat. It wasn't even Jinx's kind of pink. It was eye-blindingly neon pink. It was just as bad as eye-blinding neon orange. It was shiny and BRIGHT. It looked like it belonged to a five year old. Jinx almost burst out with 'I am NOT wearing that' but the generosity of the gesture and the gratitude got to her again. Why were people so suddenly being kind to her? Where were they all her life? Was that the ONLY coat Sam had?

"I know what you're thinkin'," Sam said. "Yes, I have other coats. No, you're not getting any. This is what you get for being stupid enough to walk around in only a shirt when it's ten below."

Oh yeah. Tough love. Jinx nearly balked at the fierce look in Sam's eyes, and Jinx didn't balk at much. Those were warrior eyes. If Jinx wanted another coat she would need to kill her boss and use her dead body to break down the door to the stairs that led to her house.

She opted instead with accepting it graciously. "Thank you," she said, and meant it.

Sam eyed something around Jinx's waistline. Jinx looked down. The rose. Sticking out of her pocket like a beacon.

Jinx looked up. Now there were half-lidded, contemplative eyes staring her in the face. And a smirk as wide as the sky. "Who's that from?"

Jinx flushed. Now half her face matched the pink marks on her cheeks. She had decided to hide the fact that she still had the rose from Wally, but she hadn't figured in her boss getting curious. "I'd prefer not to talk about it," she said firmly. Her next option was to lie. Jinx was a good actress, and Jinx was a good liar.

"Alright," said Sam. "You got it. You don't wanna talk about it, we won't talk about it. You won't hear anythin' else about it all day."

As it turned out, Sam was also a good liar. Jinx did hear something about it all day. Jinx heard EVERYTHING about it _all morning. _Late, like Sam promised, the cooks and Jinx's other co-workers filtered in. And they were all nosy as hell. The cooks weren't as bad, since they were mostly confined to the kitchen, but Sam and the two other counter girls could needle her constantly because they also worked the register and the machines that weren't in the kitchen. The only peace Jinx got was when she cleaned the bathroom, and that was unpleasant enough that she didn't take long doing it.

Finally, around noon, Jinx broke down. Jinx thought she had a high endurance. She figured if she was ever tortured she could last for a bit. But torture devices, medieval or otherwise, had nothing on a girl determined to retrieve a piece of gossip. By the time she finally told them, it was tell them the truth, go outside and start running without ever turning back, or shoot herself. Jinx didn't want to be seen any more than was necessary in the coat and she didn't have a gun, so she spilled.

"_Fine!_" she snapped, at the end of her rope. If she had to endure anymore, her neck would be at the end of someone else's rope, and she'd be jumping off a chair. "Wally gave it to me!" Who knew that a bunch of people could get so excited over a damn plant? She nearly went on in hysteria, but stopped herself, although mentally the tirade continued. _Wally gives me roses all the time! I don't get it! I hate that I have a weakness for flowers! I want to shove a rose stem in his eye for it!_

"Omigod!" Tyl said. Her sentiment was echoed by the cooks and the other counter girls.

"I KNEW it!" shrieked Lyn. She did a dance like she had just scored a touchdown. "You kept saying 'no' but I KNEW it!"

Sam gave a somewhat bemused customer his change, his drink and his take-out bag. "It was obvious," said Sam. She was excited and working hard not to let her tone reflect it. "When did he give it to you?"

"This morning, after breakfast, at home. I'm sort of living with him," said Jinx's big, stupid mouth. She clapped a hand over it, horrified.

"Omi_god_!" Tyl said. Again, the echo affect took place.

"Shit," said Jinx, waving her hands frantically. No, said the hands. No no no no no. Unfortunately no one seemed to speak hand. "I didn't mean that."

"Is he, you know, any good?" Lyn asked.

Jinx stared at her.

Lyn rolled her eyes impatiently. "In _bed_."

"I'm not sleeping with him!" Jinx said, a tad too loud. The customers sitting at the tables hid their grins and their stares. Those lined up in front of the counter didn't bother. Some of them came here for the food. Some came for the entertainment.

"Yeah, and earlier he didn't give you the rose either," said Tyl.

"Ooooooooooh," said the cooks and a few of the customers, like they were watching a TV show and someone just got verbally burned.

"I'm not lying this time! I'm just sleeping on his couch! What is WRONG with you people?!" Jinx's voice went up an octave, and she was doing the angry hand gestures thing again. When Jinx's voice got louder, she generally got more animated, too. In this case she was as embarrassed and horrified as angry.

Sam paused at the register and turned toward Jinx. Now her eyes were lie detectors. Jinx stiffened, feeling transparent. "She's not sleeping with him," said Sam finally, turning back to the impatient twenty-something on the other side of the register.

"Omigod," said Lyn. The next person who said that hybrid 'oh my God' word again was going to _suffer. _"You're living with him and you haven't slept with him yet! That is so CUTE!" She shuffled over and gave Jinx a big hug, and Jinx nearly dropped the drink she was preparing.

Immediately following the hug, muffled noise issued from Jinx's messenger bag, tossed to the side behind the counter. To everyone else it sounded like static and a voice. To Jinx it sounded like a choir of angels.

"That's my cell, I'm expecting this call and I need to take it," said Jinx, and she grabbed the bag and _sprinted_ for the bathroom. She closed and locked the door behind her, cutting off the sounds of the shop, and sunk to the floor, back to the wall. She felt okay doing so because she had cleaned the floor herself not much earlier, and she was freaking exhausted.

Digging through the bag yielded her Hive Five communicator. "What?" she spoke into it, keeping her voice low to avoid having anyone overhear.

More static. A desperate voice. "Kid Wykkyd, I don't know where you are, but get back to HQ! We have a situation!"

"SeeMore?"

Silence. Then, "…Jinx?"

"A situation? What kind of situation?" she asked, heart in her throat. Truth was, she probably loved the members of the Hive Five a bit, in her own way. Even after she left them, she still felt a fierce claim of ownership to the team. They were _her guys_. She didn't want to let them hold her back, but she didn't want to see them hurt either. They inspired maternal instincts in her. That, and pet-owner instincts.

"Don't worry about it. We've got it under control. You don't need to worry." He sounded like he hadn't meant to contact her communicator. Embarrassed and eager to end the conversation.

"Like hell," she said, and stuffed the communicator back into her bag, ignoring any additional noises it made.

She burst out of the door, looking like a woman possessed. "How long do I get for a lunch break?" she asked Sam.

"As long as you need, honey," Sam replied, looking worried.

"Thanks," said Jinx, and flew out the door. She left the jacket behind. No one stopped her. She hooved it to the embossing place next door. The coffee shop people knew the owner, and they knew he always had a back door. Jinx's world was narrowed to what was right in front of her, and she marched up to the man who owned the place, talking to a young couple. She was heedless of surroundings or manners. "Can I use your bathroom?" she asked bluntly.

The man blinked at her. "Okay," he said slowly. He probably figured that if he didn't let her use it, she would shoot him. He was half right. "Go down that hallway, it's to the left."

She was moving before he finished talking, and the bathroom door slammed behind her. She tore off her clothes and jammed herself into her 'I am up to no good' clothes. She did her hair magic and slid on the black bands to hold it in place. The civilian clothes went in the bag, the rose went into her hand, and Jinx went back into the hallway, taking the door at the end of the hall to an alley. Convenient. She made a mental note to use this whenever she needed to change. It was by no means anywhere near what would be a good, safe situation to switch personas, but she had no clue how other heroes or villains did it, and before the last few days she had never needed to execute such a change, so she'd stick with it.

She took off towards a busier street and flagged down a cab. Sometimes Jinx had trouble flagging down a cab. Today Jinx looked like she was willing to pay a lot of money if a cab would stop for her. One slowed down in the middle of the street, and she ran across two lanes of traffic to get to it. A lot of people honked and braked and swore at her, and she ignored them. She slid into the cab. If the driver recognized her as a criminal they didn't show it and didn't care. They probably just wanted her to pay her fare.

She barked an order at the cab driver and the cab took off. She had named a location somewhat close to HQ. She didn't have time to walk all the way to get there today, so she'd only take part of it on foot today. She still needed the bit of leeway to make sure no one knew where she was going and that no one was following her.

When the cab reached its destination after what seemed an eternity, Jinx threw what she was sure was at least ten dollars too much into the front seat. Damn, she was even paying cab fare now. So that was only one criminal act all day. She was going to go into withdrawal. This was some kind of record.

She didn't even bother to tell him to keep the change. She just flung the door open before the taxi came to a full stop and hurtled out of the car, intent on getting to HQ as soon as possible. She stumbled slightly when she hit the pavement, but caught her balance and kept running. Jinx was an acrobat. If Jinx could cartwheel gracefully out of the way of a bunch of gun turrets, Jinx could jump out of a moving taxi cab without falling on her ass.

As it happened, Jinx reached one of the doors into HQ just behind Kid Wykkyd. He looked back, nodded acknowledgement, and held up the arm of his cloak in front of the door. Ladies first.

She didn't break stride. She just ducked, and hurtled into the cape. She emerged on the other side of the door and ran for the stairs

There had been no room in Jinx's bag for the boots. She didn't think that she would need her costume today anyway. So she was pounding down the hallway to the stairs in her Jinx outfit and pink Vans. Even if Kid Wykkyd had been the chattiest man alive he wouldn't have commented. He was _way_ too smart to do that.

When they reached the end of the hallway, Kid Wykkyd grabbed her arm. Jinx skidded to a stop, and he wrapped them both in his cloak. What followed were the most nausea and vertigo-inducing moments she had endured in the past week, besides being grilled for details on a dumb rose by her co-workers.

They were sliding through the floors. At least, Jinx assumed they were. She had no sense of direction at all, and everything was dark. Not even really lightless room black, or closing-your-eyes black. This was nothingness. This was the absence of everything, and the presence of nothing. The only thing that was solid was the hand on her upper arm, and she had an earth-shatteringly frightening moment where she considered what might happen if it let go. Sure, she had gone through the cloak before. But that was always too short a duration to notice what it was really like.

Suddenly the world appeared again, and they both dropped a centimeter to the floor. Well, now Jinx knew why Kid Wykkyd never used the stairs. She buckled, and only stayed up because Kid Wykkyd grabbed her other arm.

"Jeez," she said, a bit more weakly than she would have liked.

Kid Wykkyd looked like he was thinking about smiling. Like, 'gee, I do that all the time, you get used to it.'

While she was waiting for her knees to solidify, Jinx grabbed for the communicator in her bag with a shaky hand. She found it and lifted it, the shaking marginally better now. "We're outside the room," she said into it. 'The room' meant the room SeeMore was in. She assumed they were outside the room, because it was unlikely that Kid Wykkyd had missed a floor. Then again, you never knew. "We're coming in."

Static again. "You might wanna brace yourself. It's pretty bad."

Jinx's heart jumped back up to her throat. She felt sick, and not just from the ride through nothing-land she had just endured. She didn't want it to be bad. She wanted her guys to be okay.

Like the stupid plunge-forward person she was, Jinx didn't brace herself. She didn't even wait until she felt like her stomach had left the top floor and joined the rest of her bodily organs again to totter towards the door. Again, wisely, Kid Wykkyd said nothing and didn't interfere, but floated along beside her in silence.

The door in front of them slid open. Jinx felt like fainting, and Jinx did not faint. She wished she had taken SeeMore's advice. She still didn't think that bracing herself would have made any difference.

It was the same room that she had talked to them in last. When she left it, it had been mostly renovated, and there had been a couch fort battle taking place. Now, it was completely and utterly… destroyed.

There was no other word for it. Well, okay, grab a thesaurus and there were plenty of other words for it, but that was the only meaning that fit. Someone, or several people, or an army, had gone through this room, and, Jinx realized with a sinking feeling, probably the rest of the base. This wasn't like the mischievous havoc that Kid Flash had wreaked. This was cold and brutal devastation. Whatever had been here had left nothing intact. The TV screen had gaping holes in it, and wiring was ripped out and strewn about. Any furniture had been gutted and torn to shreds. Shit, even the _walls _were pockmarked, like a thousand bombs had gone off in the room.

And in the middle of it stood SeeMore, back to the door, looking small and sad and a little lost. What he looked the most, however, was angry.

Jinx was glad to see this. Anger was a good thing. It also meant that she could put her own anger on hold for a second and just feel hopeless. Her vision went dark, and everything was swirling and changing, like an afterimage or looking into bright sunlight for a second. She could see a bit of Kid Wykkyd in the corner of her eye. His expression didn't change, but she knew he was probably going through the same thing. She waited until she was sure she wasn't going to pass out.

"…Is it all like this?" Jinx's voice was almost a whisper. It seemed even softer than it was in the big, empty, ruined room.

"More or less," SeeMore replied.

The back of Jinx's throat was burning like crazy, and her eyes ached. She wanted to burst into tears but would claw her own eyes out first. "Where are Gizmo and Mammoth and Billy?" She felt _really_ sick.

"They're fine," SeeMore said quickly.

Relief flooded her. The urge to cry was even greater. She would even say that keeping composed was harder now than it had been when Stone turned into Cyborg and then stabbed her in the back right when she had thought everything was going to be okay for the rest of her life. Back then, selfishly, she could only think of herself. It had been all for her. Now, it was for her boys.

She pressed her palms into her eyes until the dots that swam there were self-inflicted, until she saw stars. _Whoever went through here_, she realized with alarming clarity, _wasn't just doing so out of spite. They were **looking** for something._

And by the looks of things, they hadn't found it.

Then, finally, Jinx felt a rush of fury. True fury, righteous fury, hot and broiling and maddening, that made her anger of the morning seem like a dust mote facing a mountain. _Good._ She was fucking _glad _they hadn't found whatever they were looking for. If it was up to Jinx, they would _never _even _touch_ whatever they wanted. And right now Jinx felt like anything she damn well wanted was up to her.

She stepped forward. Then again. One foot after the other. Kid Wykkyd followed, and she came to stand by SeeMore's side, staring at the cleared space in front of him. Among all the damage, all the wreckage, all the ruin, there was a two-foot circle of clean tile with a card in the center. It was the same as the one Jinx had found only this morning, tucked into the suit of a boy with a flamethrower. It seemed ages ago and moments ago at the same time.

"I'm going to find who did this," she said, in a sibilant hiss. The words were somehow achingly more real this time around, multiplied by the utter silence that followed them. The know wasn't even necessary. She would track them down. And she didn't _want_ to find who did _this_. She was _going_ to. She _would._

Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew her eyes were glowing. She felt something brush down her legs. The rose she'd forgotten about was falling apart. The brushes she felt were falling petals. They turned into dust before they hit the ground.

The two standing next to her knew what was coming next.

She said it anyway.

"I'm going to make them _pay_."

In that moment, this, above all things, she was sure of.

* * *

End A/N (bunch of crap blabbering you should probably ignore): I just blasted through this awesome book series, and it was so good it made me want to write. So I wrote. And if my writing seems any different, it's the effect of the series. I can't help it. I actually think it's for the better. And I was kind of timely on this update. I am so damn proud of myself and so happy that people read and enjoy my stuff, and I'm in love with this story, despite all its failings. Including too much OC involvement. Sorry again, I know it's boring as hell for you to have to hear about these damn coffee shop people you don't care about to get to the characters you know, I'm going to look into dragging in a lesser-mentioned Teen Titans villain in for Jinx to play off of, one that's appeared in the series.

This chapter is really short, especially compared to the last, but I again felt it was the best place to end it (oh man I ended it in a pretty low place), and I guess it's okay since the update time is better than last time. Don't get me wrong, the update time still sucks, but I'm getting better. With school I just tend to get sucked up in getting through each day, and when I get into my rhythm the weeks melt away, and I can't even believe it's been so long since the last update. Sorry guys.

Also I played around a bit with Kid Wykkyd's powers. I'm just assuming like crazy here. And isn't he the cutest? I'm horrible. I'm a horrible fangirl. I'll fangirl for anything, jeez. But seriously, he is adorable. Don't worry I won't be sacrificing any of our main character goodness to focus on him, but I thought I'd just say so. Also, just a note, the 'gee, I do that all the time, you get used to it' is more Jinx's interpretation of what Wykkyd is thinking as opposed to what he actually is thinking, thus the gee, which I use a lot when Jinx is thinking or talking. She strikes me as almost as sarcastic as Kid Flash, but maybe that's just me. ONE LAST BLABBERNOTE: Yes I know the quote at the end is slightly different that the episode quote. It's changed to be slightly more dramatic and to reflect her situation. This is the second time around, not the original.

Now accepting: your two cents. Or five cents, or twenty five cents, or whatever else you want to leave. Gush, rant, criticize, ask me a question- anything that's spare mental change. If you feel like it, leave a review.


	7. Dramatics for Beginners

A/N: I suck at cars so hard that the vacuum cleaner companies are all beating down my door dying to know my secret. I know the cars (our VEHICLES) in Lightspeed probably weren't based on anything in particular, but I have no idea what brand I could attribute to them at all. Just warnin' ya. Though, finally, this chapter is EDITED:'D Much thanks to Natarie for beta-ing. BTW, 'freak accident girl' came from her. ;)

I also suck at updating in a timely matter but unfortunately you all know that. Thanks to those who still read my stuff even though I am about as reliable as… as an unreliable thing. I'm just, I'm so grateful I could- ROARGHFHG –devours readership-

* * *

Back at the HIVE Academy, the students were able to choose from a wide variety of less-than-average classes. Among these there were courses that every student was required or strongly encouraged to take, despite the vast fields of villainy open to them and the different instruction required for each. Some, like History of Villainy, were somehow extraordinarily more boring than should logically be possible for such a potentially interesting subject. Some, like Art of Subtlety, had tests with such complex and extensive material to cover and such dire warnings against any sort of cheating, with the result being suspension or even expulsion, that it took most students a quarter of the year to realize that the whole point of the class and the only way to pass it was figuring out new, ingenious way to cheat on each test without being caught. And some, like Dramatics for Beginners, were laughably easy. A total cake-walk.

SeeMore had flunked Dramatics for Beginners more thoroughly than anyone had managed to fail it for years, and Jinx was starting to see why.

"How're you going to do that?"

Jinx sighed and massaged her temples. The headache that had plagued her almost every moment that she was with her team was threatening to live again. "No, SeeMore. You don't ask how I'm going to do it. I have _no_ idea how I'm going to find them and make them pay. I don't even know who 'them' _is._ But the polite thing to do is to pause significantly after I vow revenge."

SeeMore was undeterred. "But if you don't know how to find them, why'd you say it?"

The headache rose from its grave and started eating her brains, the pain settling into a cozy space just behind her eyes. "You have _no_ flair for dramatics."

SeeMore ignored her weary outburst. "Jinx, what are you doing here? You left. I don't know where you went, but you can't just come back without an explanation."

Slowly, her hands dropped, and Jinx looked SeeMore square in the eye. "When I left, I said that I'd come here if you guys needed me. I meant it," she said, voice soft.

"No, you didn't. You said to call you if-"

"ARGH! Just forget it!" Okay, _how _did Kid Flash do that Suddenly-Mr.-Serious thing in the middle of his clown act? She had been so sure she would be able to copy it! She had been grave and somber! She had been serious! This was _serious business!_

Kid Wykkyd stood there exuding a slightly alarmed air. He was afraid he was going to have to stop Jinx from trying to strangle SeeMore. This was a lot harder than it seemed, and it seemed pretty darn impossible.

The door slid open, heralding the arrival of Gizmo, to the relief of Kid Wykkyd and the disappointment of Jinx (two witnesses to a murder were tougher to deal with than one). "It's like the crud-munchers were lookin' for something. Mosta the place is messed up but everything's salvageable," said Gizmo. "It looks like this room got the worst of it. Billy's splitting up and checking the rest of the base. Mammoth's being all mopey over his dumb pie. But I don't get why- Jinx!"

She bypassed his shocked look and focused on the news. "Then not everything's as bad as this room? Funny, _someone_ told me otherwise." Here she shot one of her patented Pointed Glares at SeeMore.

SeeMore glared right back. "Well, I guess I was just being _dramatic._"

Ding ding ding! Score one for SeeMore. He'd be breaking mirrors and falling into open manholes for the next week but it was _so worth it._

Jinx actually had to take a moment to regroup her mental facilities before responding. "I'll go check on Mammoth." She turned around and sauntered lazily towards the door Gizmo had entered through, telling herself that she wasn't retreating in the same mental tone of voice employed by alcoholics saying that they could stop anytime they wanted to, really.

"And then you'll LEAVE," SeeMore shouted after her.

She just lifted her arm without turning in a half-assed attempt at a wave as the door slid shut behind her. Dang, was she cool or what?

Back in the room, Gizmo slid a look at SeeMore. "Where's the card?'

"It's right…" SeeMore trailed off, mouth still open, staring at the empty space on the floor where, he could have sworn, the card had been just seconds before.

Gizmo rolled his eyes.

---

Jinx twirled the card around in her hand before stowing it in her bag as she strolled into the kitchen. There wasn't a lot of destruction here—just a lot of stuff taken out of drawers, pizza boxes put in the pantries and a pie in the microwave, where Mammoth had failed to look. His Pie Radar was broken today. It was a sad occasion. Let us have a moment of silence for the Pie Radar.

When Jinx got a look at her poor pie-deprived friend, he looked so suitably depressed that Jinx took pity on him. Well, not really. She wanted a favor. "Mammoth? Do you want pie?"

Mammoth bypassed the confused questioning of Jinx's relationship with her former team stage that the other members of the Five lapsed into when seeing Jinx. He was a simple guy, and had an easier time dealing with confusion than the rest of the Five. Everything he could ever need was right in front of him, spelled out in bold lettering: Jinx was here. Jinx was offering pie. Glorious pie!

"Yeah!" he said.

Jinx traipsed over to the microwave and retrieved the pie. (Her own Pie Radar was up and running smoothly.) Mammoth received it with the wide eyes of a mother being handed her newborn child. Except, well, then he stuffed it into his mouth and ate it with loud 'OM NOM NOM' noises, and mothers usually refrained from that, thank goodness.

When he was done Jinx couldn't help smiling. Mammoth was so easy to please. It made giving him things that much more rewarding. "Now, could you do me a favor?"

"Sure!" he nodded eagerly. He was like putty in her hands. She was the Pie Goddess. The Goddess of Pie. She bought the pie, and bore the pie home, and then when all was lost she resurrected the pie from the dead. Well, from the microwave, but still.

The dark pact made, she led him up to the garage, trying to push coherent thought from her head. She looked perfectly calm and composed traversing the staircases that lined their H-shaped base. Unfortunately, if she let her thoughts catch up with her, every stair she stepped on would crumble under her feet. Jinx was trying to learn to control her powers. But despite her unorthodox schooling, she still had a lot of trouble with it and that scared her. Having a power that could only destroy- she could deal with that. She had never considered (up until now) occupying a position where she would need to do anything else. But not being able to control it? That was frightening. It was even worse, since Jinx had such hotheaded, willful tendencies.

In retaliation, she had tried to master the art of emotional repression. And failed, of course. The best she had ever managed to do was act overly defensive, hardening herself into something seemingly cold-hearted and bitchy. But at times like this, when she was roiling with real anger and not just the usual exhausted irritation, an unthinking gesture or concentrating on any one object could have less than desirable results. So she walked on, counting the steps, memorizing the details of her shoes, listening to the sounds of her light footsteps and Mammoth's lumbering gait… Anything to distract herself and keep herself from making the base any more of a wreck than it already was.

Finally, Jinx and Mammoth reached the end of the garage corridor (luckily without bumping into any of Billy's clones), and the door slid upwards to reveal a graveyard of cars—the aftermath of an intruder. Not even the latest intruders, even. They had just never gotten around to cleaning this up after Kid Flash trashed it. No, the latest intruders hadn't changed anything except maybe left a car door or two open. They had probably appreciated how easy it was to mess everything up, considering it was already a pigsty. With all the broken glass and pathetically ruined machines, it looked like the land of the misfit toys.

Although… Stepping into the room, Jinx did a quick scan of the number of vehicles. Mammoth didn't question her silence as he was still basking in the glow of a freshly consumed pie.

_Hmm. Three missing, _thought Jinx, counting and recounting. Something to look out for. She doubted that any of the Five had noticed this, and that was a good thing.

It meant they probably wouldn't miss one more.

"Mammoth, flip that car over there back onto its wheels."

"This one?"

"Yeah. And be careful, it looks like the least damaged one."

Being almost hilariously careful in his motions, Mammoth heaved and slowly rolled one of the overturned cars onto its side, then gently eased it down onto four wheels.

Jinx smiled. "Thanks, Mammoth. You can go now."

He wasted no time in doing so. Jinx looked a bit scary at the moment. Her smile wasn't one hundred percent gratitude. It was more like fifteen percent gratitude and eighty five percent evil intent. He could see _teeth._

As the door slid shut behind Mammoth, Jinx paced around the car once, appraising it for any damage. It was definitely the least damaged car, seeing as all of its windows were intact. It was a bit scratched up on the sides, there was a black smudge on the driver's side door handle, and it wasn't exactly the most ego-enhancing, overcompensating awesome-mobile out there, but it looked like it would run and it was a nice shade of red.

What she would never tell anyone was that she had a bit of an attachment to this car. The scratches had actually been acquired before she had ever even heard of Kid Flash, back during finals freshman year at HIVE Academy. The car had pulled through her practical exams, and even if it was a bit beaten up at the end, Jinx remembered it and identified it by the black smudge on the door handle, which was actually from a sharpie she had been holding when she yanked it open in her haste to get in the car first. The rule was: whoever muscled into the seat first got to drive, and at the time, Jinx was unable to trifle herself with such trivialities as sharpie caps. Well, she remembered it by the black smudge and the dent on the side from where she rammed a car belonging to a fellow HIVE student off the road and into the wall of a Seven Eleven. Ah, memories.

If it still ran, she was gold. Jinx opened the door, tossed her bag in the back, slid in, shut the door behind her and spent a minute fighting with the adjustable seat to make it suitable for Jinx-in-sneakers instead of Jinx-in-platform-boots. That nastiness taken care of, she fished the keys out of the glove compartment and, taking a deep breath, revved the engine.

The car roared to life, settling into a comfortable hum. Old Red would live to ram more cars into Seven Elevens. At least there was _some _stability in Jinx's life.

She shifted into drive and maneuvered around the other cars littering the concrete, then accelerated as she headed for the north exit. She pressed the button on the garage opener stashed in the cup holder. It didn't work, but no matter.

Jinx unrolled her window and leaned out as she approached the closed door. One hand stayed on the wheel and the other reached towards the door, shooting a steady stream of pink energy centered on her exit point. Pink light and decay radiated outward from the area of contact, but at her current velocity, for a moment it seemed like she wouldn't make it.

Then she burst through the rusted, weak metal with a large CRUNCH and sailed down the exit ramp. Gizmo wouldn't let her punch holes in his beloved doors in the past, but she was free now. She brushed some metal fragments off her shirt and tossed a chunk of garage door out the window, a satisfied smirk playing across her lips. Nothing like a bit of destruction to lighten her mood.

As she closed the window, fishtailed out of the lot on a bit of ice and drove away, the smirk dwindled, fighting against the onset of reality. It was a valiant battle, but eventually the smirk succumbed to serious thoughts of what Jinx had just witnessed and died an honorable death. Another moment of silence, please. It will be respectfully buried next to Mammoth's Pie Radar.

A somber line took the place of the smirk, and she sighed infinitesimally as she started the trip back to the coffee shop. It felt odd to be going back to her job after the shock of finding out that the base could, in fact, be destroyed further than both her team and Kid Flash had managed to destroy it.

The worst part was that it would have been perfectly feasible to search the entire base without disturbing anything. Jinx's blood ran cold and her hands tightened uncomfortably on the steering wheel as she contemplated this, driving on autopilot. It hadn't been much easier to tear everything up in the process of looking for whatever they wanted. Whoever did it, she supposed, knew where she came from, and they were acting out in response to the admittedly anticlimactic defeat of Heatwave. They wanted something. The thought pissed her off even more, if that was possible.

It had been an effort to prove a point. It was a warning. It was revenge.

"It's my fault," she said.

"'What's your fault?"

"GAH!" Jinx jerked out of her reverie. Unfortunately, her hands jerked with her and she nearly sideswiped a jeep before she righted herself in the flow of traffic. When she was back on track, she gritted her teeth and shot a furious look at the speedster in full Kid Flash regalia currently lounging in the passenger seat like he belonged there.

"You know, you really would make a good hero," he said casually, as if he was continuing a conversation. "Playing the blame game and losing every time is an integral part of the job. I've seen Robin do it often enough."

Well, hell, if he wanted to talk like they weren't getting odd looks from anyone who looked into their car, who was she to stop him? Two could play at that game. "You know Robin?" she asked, slanting her eyes at him again, trying not to look too interested.

"He trusted me with the city, didn't he?" Kid Flash crossed his arms behind his head and smiled at her.

She looked away from him before she caused an accident. "If anything that means he doesn't know you well enough. I wouldn't trust you with a small child, much less an entire city."

"Oh, that _hurts_. There's no reason to get angry. If you want to help so much you could just ask. I'd be happy to allow it. We could be partners."

She shot him a look of mock surprise. "BRILLIANT! You can go and save the day, and then I'll show up when it's all over and transform into my hero alter-ego, Freak Accident Girl! After I break shit up we'll call the cops and run. We'll be the best team ever."

He turned to face her. Jinx swung around to watch the road again so quickly she was pretty sure she gave herself whiplash. That had been The Serious Face. It was hard enough to keep her composure when he was being flirty. Once he got that serious look in his eyes she ended up falling into the mood and then looking like an idiot when he took the opportunity to break the spell in the most frustrating way imaginable. Geez, she'd never be able to eat a sandwich with mustard on it again.

_Shit._ _He's leaning forward._ What was he doing? What was he _doing?_

As he loomed closer, Jinx appeared more and more concentrated on driving. As opposed to appearing like she had the slightest consciousness of his proximity. Of the fact that he smelled really nice and radiated heat and that she could feel his breath fanning over her neck and holy _crap_, she needed an eject button for the passenger seat—

There was the sound of super-speed, a click, and then Kid Flash was lounging in his seat again, thankfully out of her personal space, though not for long. What Jinx knew was that Kid Flash loved to invade her personal space. What she didn't know, for the good of her mental health, was that he liked being in her personal space more than being in his own and was considering moving in. But that's neither here nor there.

It took another minute for her to realize what had just happened, and when she did she was so shocked that she stopped at a light just as it turned red. This was a mark of her bemusement, because Jinx _never _passed up a chance to gun a yellow.

"Did you just BUCKLE my SEATBELT?"

"Safety first." Kid Flash broke out into a cheesy grin.

"That's it. Get out of this car. I'm kicking you out. Now. _Out._"

"You can't kick me out, I'm a superhero," he said. When she looked like she was about to protest at the logic of this, he continued, "And if you kick me out I'll flag down the nearest cop and send them after a certain someone who I'm sure doesn't have a license and registration."

"Check the glove compartment," she said, accelerating once the light turned green and eyeing a Dunkin' Donuts as she passed it. She was nearing the coffee shop and she had to keep the place in mind. You never knew when you needed an emergency donut. For comfort consumption. Or choking your passenger to death.

Kid Flash opened the glove compartment. "Jesus! There's a gun in here!"

"Oh. That's not what I meant. Gizmo must have left that there." She reached over and picked it up. It looked like a gun that had been experimented on and then turned into a mutant gun, which in a way it had. Gizmo liked weaponry. Well, Jinx didn't use guns, so there was no use for it now.

She chucked it out the window.

"Oh my God! You can't just throw a lethal weapon out of a moving vehicle!" said Kid Flash, distraught. He disappeared in a blur of color and reappeared with it before it had a chance to hit the ground.

"Fine, have it your way," said Jinx. She reached over again, but this time she applied a hex to the gun. Instead of exploding like she so clearly hoped, it crumbled into harmless metal and trash, which was a good second. "There. Now there's crap all over your uniform. What are you going to do about that?"

"This." He shook himself like a Labrador. Well, a Labrador with superpowers, which wasn't really that different from a normal Labrador. The result was the same: whatever was all over the Labrador was now all over the Labrador's surroundings. The gray interior of the car was now dark gray.

"Golly. Thanks. I've been wanting to redecorate," said Jinx.

"Don't mention it," Kid Flash replied, rifling around in the glove compartment again and coming up with her driver's license this time. "Okay, this can't be legal. And your name is just printed as 'Jinx.' See, these things don't count if they were made in someone's basement."

"It wasn't made in someone's basement. It was made in the Academy's computer lab." This said, Jinx swung the car into an alley, her newest best friend, stopped in the middle of it, and put the car in park.

"Jinx?" asked Kid Flash. He looked a bit wary. Maybe getting gun entrails all over her transportation took it a bit too far? But hell, he wasn't even calling her on the illegality of it all. Much. If only because he'd get her to take the exam legally sooner or later. Most likely later, seeing as Jinx didn't have a legal name, much less a paper trail.

"Keep watch for me, will you? I need to change." Jinx clambered into the back of the car. Yeah, this wasn't exactly top-notch when it came to changing into her civilian persona, but it was a miracle that she hadn't been pulled over so far and she was a block away from the coffee shop.

"Change?"

Jinx leaned forward and rested her elbow on the back of Kid Flash's seat. "Don't you dare say a _word_. I don't know how you manage it, but I can't exactly hold my magic sword aloft and shout 'By the power of Grayskull, I have the POWER!' and my clothes will be suddenly transformed. And I swear, if you so much as THINK of looking, you will PAY."

Jinx threatened to make people pay a lot. She wasn't sure what they were paying with yet, though lives would be appropriate. Or souls. Money would be okay too. She was suffering from a serious lack of normal clothing, and a shopping spree wouldn't pay for itself.

Kid Flash just smiled and turned forward. Jinx felt completely, _utterly _uncomfortable changing with him in the front seat, but she knew what this was. This was a competition. Let's see if Jinx will give up and ask Kid Flash to leave and have to end up sounding all awkward and embarrassed even though she shouldn't have to. This was something he wouldn't win. Jinx wasn't one to be cowed by modesty.

Still, it didn't make this any less awkward. She started changing as quickly as was possible in the back of the car, which wasn't actually very quick, but rather cumbersome and frustrating. This pretty much ruined her plan to follow through with changing so quickly that she didn't have time to think about what she was doing. To her further consternation, Kid Flash still insisted on talking to her. As if it wasn't enough that she had to keep up with him while she was in possession of all her clothes, now she had to do it while she wasn't wearing any pants.

"So, I assume that you were just at HIVE Five headquarters for a brief social call."

Jinx choked on her own saliva. Oh, sure. Attack her when she was at her most vulnerable. She hadn't exactly been considering the current situation when she decided to wear her lucky unicorn underwear this morning. She decided that trying to put on pants while wearing shoes was a lost cause and stopped for a second with an innocent expression that Kid Flash couldn't see at the moment if he valued his life at all. "Why, Kid Flash, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Which would explain why you're driving this car that I could have _sworn _belongs in their basement."

Jinx blew out a breath. Well, what the hell, he already knew, so no point in wasting her excellent lying skills on the likes of a superhero. "No. They… I still have the communicator, and SeeMore contacted me by mistake. Someone trashed the base… again. And I wanted to check it out."

He was silent for a moment, and when he spoke his voice was gentle. "You can't keep looking out for them, Jinx. If you decide to be a hero, you can't be in a situation where you'd let them go just because they were your team."

She was a little pissed at that. "Look, if I had to kick their asses, I would. But that doesn't mean that-"

"It's not just that. Sooner or later, they're going to need to stop relying on you, too."

Jinx finally managed to ram herself into her pants and climbed into the front. She didn't start the car right away, but instead sat still for a moment and thought about what he said. Right. Please read 'what he said' as 'ways to kill Kid Flash.' "Listen, you stay the hell out of this. It has nothing to do with you. Unless, of course, I was just stopping by to tell them that I know who Kid Flash _really_ is, which is more than likely."

He just watched her all knowingly, which was kind of irritating her- not that a lot of the things he did didn't irritate her.

"Don't you give me that look! I've given you no reason to trust me!" She gave him a disgusted look through the sunglasses. So she had let him go instead of turning him over to Madame Rouge. He had been lucky then, and he shouldn't let it go to his head.

"You've protected my secret. You know who I am," he said.

"I've barely known it very long," she said.

"And you told me who _you _are."

She edged the sunglasses down on her nose so it wouldn't spare him the intensity of her glare. Unfortunately this worked both ways. Damn those blue eyes. "That doesn't mean anything. I made that name up on the spot. It's not even that important."

Suddenly his expression sharpened and she regretted not having the protective barrier of her sunglasses. She went to push them back over her eyes, but his hand darted out faster than she could blink and caught her wrist, fingers curling around her hand, thumb against her palm. He was wearing gloves, but heat still seeped through them. The only thing that kept her from sending him right through the windshield from pure outrage was shock. The serious moment was turning into a serious conversation. This couldn't bode well.

"No. You're wrong," he said. "It is important. You said you were new to the disguise thing. Well, you need to know to protect it. At all costs. It's one of the most important things you can ever have. You might not think that it matters because you've only had your secret identity for a day or so. But consider this: in that small amount of time, you've already interacted with everyone in that coffee shop. Think about it. One of your enemies could exploit that. Every one of those people might have to deal with the consequences of your secret getting out."

She stared at him with wide eyes. She knew all this. She knew _all _of this. It was just so strange thinking of it as a problem _she _would have to deal with.

And Kid Flash had more to lose than she did. _So _much more. He had a family, and a lifetime of friends and acquaintances. His identity was legal and not just a name pulled out of his head.

And he had put it all in her hands.

"Shit," she whispered. "You trust me."

"Yeah," he affirmed, smile taking its place again. His grip had loosened somewhat, and his thumb was brushing across her palm lazily. It was… distracting, to say the least. "I trust you."

Okay. She could _not _deal with this right now. Her thoughts careened about but she wasn't really thinking anything at all. What she had on her hands was the equivalent of a mental error message; 404, page cannot be found. Sorry, this brain is temporarily unavailable.

Unfortunately for Kid Flash, Jinx was the type to take her anger out on the nearest thing she could get her hands on. Right now she was running on two hours of sleep, a shit-load of guilt, and a much larger amount of fury. Most of which was directed at the moron in front of her, who had the _audacity _to say he _trusted _her. Where the _hell _did he get off doing that?!

Which was why she repossessed her hand with an irritable jerk and, eyes glowing pink with rage, replaced it around his throat. She did so with a good amount of force, and he fell back, head hitting the passenger's window with a _crack_. She leaned forward and fisted her other hand around his neck. She was on her knees now, bending forward so she bore down on him, not choking him _yet, _though she wanted to, so badly.

He didn't wince when his head hit the window, or look like he was the least bit fazed. Nope, having a villain- hero- _thing _put her hands around his neck in something that most certainly was _not _an embrace of love and camaraderie was just all in a day's work. By the way, your mad, glowing eyes look positively ravishing today, care to go out for dinner?

His calm gaze only served to incite her more. She put pressure on his neck until one eye twitched in pain, then let up, grinning sadistically. Still, he didn't even bring a hand up to stop her. "First of all," she hissed, face twisted into something ugly and hateful, "how I handle _my _team does _not _concern you. Secondly, didn't your mother ever tell you to keep your hands to yourself?" Hm, had she called them 'her' team again? Oops. And she supposed she was being a bit hypocritical, seeing as her hands were currently about to strangle him. "Thirdly. I'm already quite aware of what someone can do with a secret identity, having taken classes on how to exploit one. As to what happens to 'those people' if someone found out who I am, I could care less. They'd just be mere casualties, nothing more."

She said the word 'casualties' with a mocking sneer, and gave one last push against his neck before drawing back almost as violently as she had attacked him. He didn't move, with his head still against the window, leaning on his elbows, eyes dark and grave.

"You don't mean that," he said softly.

"Try me," she said, pushing back incredulity. If he didn't get the picture _now, _if he wasn't regretting trusting her just a _little, _she had no idea _what _she had to do.

He pushed himself back into a sitting position leisurely, rolling his head, eyes closed. "I meant the casualties thing. You care, even if you won't admit it. If anything happened, you'd be right there fighting to protect them. I know you would."

Jinx's drawn-on eyebrows lifted up in a crestfallen look. If Kid Flash had been looking her way he wouldn't have been able to resist giving her a hug, and then he would really have been strangled to death, so it was good that he wasn't. Because Jinx had a pretty good kicked-puppy look going on. He was so _right. _She didn't want him to be, but he was. Damn him for bringing it up, too, because she could lie to herself when she didn't think it over.

Besides which, trying to frighten him had done _nothing. _She probably could have just ravished him instead and he would look the same. Actually, she might as well have done that instead, because then he would look untidy and surprised, instead of untidy and collected. _Moving away from that train of thought… _

He turned her way again and she quickly wiped the expression off her face, so there was nothing to keep him from flicking her sunglasses back in front of her eyes playfully. "Buckle up," he said.

Jinx just shot him a withering glare and shoved open her door. It was time to retreat. No point in even deluding herself otherwise. She was all out of ammo, and now she had to leave before she actually killed him. She grabbed her bag and got out of the car.

"I'm walking to work," she said. "This is my evil-mobile, and I can't drive it as a civilian." She shut the door and walked away as quickly as possible. He could be out of that car and in front of her at any second, but walking quickly still made her feel like she was accomplishing something. Still, he didn't attempt to go after her, which was a good thing because Jinx was way out of it.

She wasn't out of it enough to be able to not think about what had just transpired though, so she basically just felt crappy. She crossed her arms against the frigid air and the cold, miserable feeling currently curled up in her chest. What it boiled down to was this: She had three options. Go back to work. Start traveling and never stop until she reached the ocean or a cliff. Or, go get a giant box of donuts.

Hmmmmm.

---

Jinx opened the coffee shop door with her hip, an armful of Dunkin' Donuts merchandise obscuring her view.

Her boss, who had been preparing a stern lecture on taking THAT long for a lunch break, threw the speech out the window and welcomed her worker back with open arms. "Hell," said Sam, "You're going to need help with that."

Jinx spilled the mess on the counter, hopped behind it, and smiled, rubbing the heat back into her arms. "Definitely." Actually, she needed more help with her life than anything. She was handling the donuts pretty well.

Her co-workers helped her deplete the donut supply regardless. Man, it felt good to stuff herself. Usually Jinx had to hide any food she wanted to have a chance at eating back at the base, and those hiding places were usually discovered fairly quickly, considering that she never got around to stealing herself any extra fridges or freezers with combination locks.

By the time four p.m. rolled around, Jinx's body composition was around twenty percent donut, and she had decided: This was heaven. Who cared if she should be saving the money she used on baked goods for clothes and a place somewhere far away from Jump City? Who cared if she had to find out what group Heatwave belonged to, or if he was working alone, before he or they did more damage? Who cared if Kid Flash was a freaking idiot for trusting her with such an important thing when she was for all intents and purposes still a freaking villain—how many TIMES did she have to turn him over to an international crime organization before—

"Nodt me," Jinx said to herself through a mouthful of donut.

"What?" asked her current customer, waiting patiently for their caffeinated goodness.

"Nuffing," said Jinx. Unfortunately this caused a piece of donut to crumble into her throat and she spent the next minute having a coughing fit on the floor. At the end of it she stared up at the ceiling. _Nice lights, _she thought. _Gives the place a warm feeling. Like a cozy, warm bookstore, or an art supply place. _"This place has nice lights," she told her boss.

The customer peered over the counter in a concerned manner.

Jinx made a massive effort to scrape herself off the ground, and then just gave Sam a pathetic dying-animal look until the woman finally sighed and took over the espresso machine. "It really does. Did you pick the lights?" Jinx asked, wondering if she would have to wait until after she digested the donuts to pick herself up off the floor.

"Nope. My crazy, rich uncle John did. He actually owns the place. He gave it to me for my birthday," replied Sam, like she conversed with people lying on the floor all the time. "Well, he still manages it and pays for everything, but I get to take care of it."

"That would explain the lack of proper shifts and management," said Jinx. Lyn was polishing off the last of the doughnuts, so Jinx made a hand-motion and Lyn tossed one at her. Jinx made a grab for it, but it landed on her shirt instead, scattering powdered sugar all over her. Years of honing her fighting and gymnastic skills and she couldn't catch a damn donut. Then she took a bite of the donut, and it was so good Jinx couldn't feel depressed for long.

"Are you kidding?" asked Lyn, sitting down on the floor by Jinx. "We don't have proper anything, except, you know, we keep the place clean. It's awesome. Like a vacation whenever you want, with free coffee."

Jinx sat up. "I'm starting to get it. Thanks for inviting me to paradise, by the way." She and Lyn clinked donuts together like they were toasting each other with fancy champagne. Classy. "Wally had something to do with it, didn't he?"

The counter girls all busied themselves with their work, which Jinx took as an affirmative. Lyn quickly tried to change the subject.

"Ugh, I shouldn't be eating this. I need to lose weight," Lyn said, staring morosely down at the donut in her hand.

Jinx sighed. "And I need to_ gain_ weight," she said, staring morosely down at her chest.

"Sweet!" said Lyn. "Fat transfusion!"

They both adopted looks of intense concentration, put their hands together, and made fat transfusion noises, which basically consisted of loud humming.

Relaxing with her co-workers (and the donuts) had done a lot to improve Jinx's mood. However, she was still very, very in the mood for revenge of any kind. Which was why, when the door opened and Wally West strolled in, daring to show his face, Jinx jumped up with a bloodthirsty look in her eyes and a smile on her face.

"Wally!" she cried, in a sugary sweet tone that spoke of angels and unicorns and wide, grassy meadows with grass made of the dreams of children. The last time she had used that tone, she had proceeded to knock him unconscious with a Caution: Wet Floor sign, so he was understandably cautious. The caution escalated to alarm when she vaulted over the counter, bag swinging at her side, ran up to him, and threw her arms around his neck, falling against him in what to all intents and purposes was a hug.

He would have felt safer if she had tried to choke him.

She smirked into his hoodie. It was Flash merchandise, with a lightning bolt emblazoned on the back and a smaller one on the front. And she was going to wear it back to the apartment, instead of that puffy monstrosity of a coat Sam wanted her to wear.

She slid her hands into his back pockets. Bingo! Wallet. She threw it behind the counter, telling herself that it was for her _plan, _just to get his wallet and throw it away to slow him down, and she had not just copped a feel at _all. _

Before Wally could make some remark about how she couldn't keep her hands off him, she socked him in the gut and tore the hoodie off of him when he doubled over in response. She tugged it over her own head as she ran to the door. "Bye, guys!" she said, waving gaily, then tore out onto the sidewalk.

Back in the store, five of Jinx's co-workers and a few patrons of the store stood with slack-jawed expressions, wide eyes, and hands half-raised in farewell.

"Wow," said Sam, leaning over the counter and raising her eyebrows at Wally. "What the hell did you do to deserve that?"

He just shook his head and flopped onto the floor.

Jinx caught a look of this as she ran past the window, and smirked to herself with glee. Revenge! It felt good. She felt that she had successfully sated her need to inflict physical harm on Kid Flash. Now she just needed to hoof it back to the apartment and grab her stuff. She had reached a decision: she couldn't be near him anymore. Not when he kept spouting truths left and right, and had gotten closer to her than she had allowed anyone in ages. So she was going back to grab her laundry, her dignity, and maybe her sanity, and make a break for it.

Was she running away? No. Of course not. She was just… reevaluating her options. After all, now she had a car! Jinx had always wanted to be a car-hobo. Really.

Although she would miss tormenting Kid Flash. She thought back to his shell-shocked face and a giddy sort of happiness bubbled up in her until she gave a maniacal chuckle.

It felt so nice that she laughed some more, until she was cackling nonstop as she ran for the building. Maniacal laughter was a therapeutic experience. Whenever you did something evil or diabolical or just mischievous, there came an inherent need to let it all out in the classic evil laugh. And damn, did it feel good. If Jinx ever lost her mind and became a hero, she wouldn't be able to give it up. She would put her enemies to shame with evil laughter.

She was still letting out sinister snickers when she got to the building, although they were interspersed with panting. Her legs were burning, and her lungs were on fire, and there was a stitch in her side. Screw the back door, she was taking the elevator. Waiting for it wouldn't matter much. She had run non-stop here, and she wasn't anywhere _near _being a match for Wally's speed, but he was a civilian. He'd need to get his wallet and go home the _normal _way. There was little chance he'd guess that she was leaving, so this way she could pack up, leave a note, and be gone before he even got home.

She limped over to the elevator and missed in her first two attempts to hit the up button before it finally worked. As she waited there, a scrawny grandma-looking old lady several inches shorter than Jinx tottered up to stand next to her. She broke out into a cold sweat as the woman narrowed her eyes at Jinx from behind coke-bottle spectacles. She just wanted to leave- she didn't want a scene at the last moment before she could make her escape.

When the elevator arrived with a _ding, _they both stepped in, and all the woman said was, "Floor four, please. I haven't seen you around here. Moving in?"

Jinx tapped in their floors on the elevator console and smiled nervously. "Uh, no. I just got here. But I'm, um… moving out."

The woman nodded understandingly. "Fight with your boyfriend, huh?"

Jinx shook her head vehemently. "He's not my boyfriend. I was just crashing at his place."

The woman nodded some more, looking like a thin old bobble-head. "You know, you remind me of my daughter. That's what she said before she caught her roommate sleeping with another man. She dyed her hair pink, just like yours, and got a bunch of them piercings, and started dating other women. Thank goodness I have a son, or else I'd never get any grandchildren." The woman laughed uproariously.

"…"

"I've been thinking of getting one of them belly button piercings myself. I wouldn't mind a new 'place to crash' at." She elbowed Jinx in the side with a wink. "Whaddya think?"

_Ding. _Jinx's floor. Thank _god. _

Jinx turned around as she left and waved. "Nice meeting you," she said. "And I, er… I think a belly button piercing would be great. Go crazy."

The moment the elevator door closed, Jinx became a secret agent, which basically meant that she darted around in a crouch and looked around corners. She glanced down the hallway and pretended she was James Bond. The hallway was empty.

She counted to three, and then made a dash for the door, humming 'secret agent man' mentally. She wrestled with the doorknob for a minute before remembering the lock and hexing it. She flew into the apartment and shut the door behind her, breathing heavily.

She was a sucky secret agent, but whatever. Jinx grabbed her old clothes that were thrown haphazardly in a pile against the wall and stuffed them into her bag, before she hurried over to the kitchen counter. No pen or paper. She wrestled with her bag until she procured some from her art supplies, then set to work, looking up nervously every second or so. Kid Flash could be here any minute, and when he arrived she wanted to be gone. Avoidance? Cowardice? Nooooo.

'Dear Kid Flash,' she wrote.

Then crumpled the paper and threw it in the trash.

'Dear Wally.' Crumple.

'Wally,' Better. 'I need a bit of space. Let's just forget you ever told me who you were, okay? It's best if I hit the road and got out of Jump City as fast as possible. I'm going to wrap up the business with my team and whoever attacked them just because I beat up some twerp in an alley-'

Wait. Had she told him about the alley? No. Ugh. Crumple.

'Wally. I need a bit of space. Let's just forget you ever told me who you were, okay? It's best if I hit the road and got out of Jump City as fast as possible. I'm going to wrap up the business with my team, but that's it. Don't interfere. I might, you know, come by to say goodbye before I leave, or something. Don't get the wrong idea, I won't miss you or anything, I just-'

Crumple.

'West. I'm out. Catch you on the flip side.'

Crumple. Snicker. Face, meet palm.

'I'm leaving. Thanks for lending me your place, but I need to wrap up some business and get out of Jump City. Bye.'

She taped it on the inside of the fridge. She turned around and spotted the hedgehog on the couch. He looked up at her with big, soulful eyes.

Despite herself, she felt a burning at the back of her throat.

"Don't look at me like that," she said. She looked down, and spotted the pieces of Kid Flash's sweatshirt from the morning. She picked them up and made a little bed for the hedgehog on the couch, and then put him in it. And then covered his stupid adorable face with a piece of cloth.

Just as she was about to turn around, she heard the sound of super-speed.

_No. Way._

She closed her eyes tightly and turned around. _He's not there he's not there he's not there._

She opened her eyes.

_He's there._

He wasn't even in uniform; he was still wearing his street clothes. How did he pull _that_ off?

"No note?" he said, eyeing the overstuffed bag.

"…It's in the fridge."

He disappeared in a blur and the fridge opened, then appeared in front of her again, holding the note. She winced as his eyes darted across it and he looked up at her with something like accusation in his gaze. "That's it?"

"Stupid. You didn't read the other note." She stepped away from him and walked to the kitchen, retrieving a fork and opening the fridge. There was no other note, of course. Instead, she looked around the fridge until her eyes settled on her prize: A singular piece of key lime pie.

This would be the second time a piece of pie helped her today. She whirled around and stuck the fork in it. "Don't move, or the pie gets it!"

He made a face at her. "You're kidding."

She laughed an evil laugh. "You _think _I'm kidding. But if you move, or try to take it from me with super-speed, the fork will tear through its flaky crust and ruin this perfectly good piece of pie."

Kid Flash whispered something that sounded like '_diabolical_' under his breath.

Never presenting her back to him, Jinx edged past him and to the window, trying not to think about how ridiculous this was. This wasn't exactly the unobtrusive, final exit she had been hoping for. She fumbled the window open with one hand, balancing the pie on her knee and holding the fork with her other hand.

When she finally got it open, without any hesitation, she turned around and dropped that perfectly good piece of key lime pie out the window.

Kid Flash stood there, dumbstruck, which was just what she wanted. Jinx made a dash for the door, not bothering to look behind her. She bolted down the hallway and pressed urgently at the call button for the elevator, looking over her shoulder. The elevator arrived almost immediately, and she darted in, pressed a random floor, and dashed out before the door closed. She made for the stairs. Hopefully, Kid Flash would think she took the elevator and wait for it, because these elevators would override the elevator's current destination if the calling floor was close enough. Kid Flash wouldn't know which floor she was going to otherwise.

A young couple was coming up the stairs, so she had to walk part of the way down to avoid having security called on a crazy girl with a Flash sweatshirt bolting down the stairs, but the moment they were out of sight she sprinted the rest of the way down, almost loosing her footing twice. She didn't hear anyone in pursuit of her, so she grinned triumphantly when she burst out of the doors into the lobby. She just had to run past the elevator and then she was home free- she could see the doors. Freezing cold Jump City had never looked so inviting.

She heard the _ding _of the elevator distantly, but barely paid it any mind as she made that final dash for the door.

At least, not until a hand reached out, fisted in her collar, and pulled her into the elevator. The doors closed behind her, leaving her alone with Kid Flash, as Wally West, holding a perfectly good piece of key lime pie.

"Want a bite?"

* * *

End A/N: -diabolical laughter- Man, that really _is_ therapeutic. You should all try it. 3

Okay, that car scene was originally fun and kinda fluffy, but I realized I suck at characterization and Jinx needed to let off some steam and try to get some distance for herself, so then it all kind of degenerated to violence. And I really like how it turned out, heehee. What do you guys think?

In any case I'm just blathering away here. Dear lord if you want to review I accept it with open arms, if not, wow, I've already got over a HUNDRED FREAKING REVIEWS, I'm good. You all rock. Now read my wonderful beta's note, or I'll throw key lime pie at you.

E/N: Wey-_Hey!_ I'm baaaaaaaaackkk to reading the chapters ahead of everyone else. (pause for minor gloating _here_) Anyways, I think we need to cut down on the sugar in these chapters, as I either get hungry or a toothache. :3

And, speaking of hunger… (throws baked goods at willing readership) All of you wonderful reviewing reviewers, just keep on doing what you're doing! You 'n' me included, I can't wait for the cued romantic interlude next chapter. Super-Beta-Ri-Sama Outs! (salute)


	8. One Percent Evil

A/N: Research research research. And all I have to show for it is this short awkward little snippet that seems like it came out of nowhere. You'll know it when you see it, trust me, it's the eyesight thing. Sorry to bother you guys with it... Just, the same part of me that went 'ROBIN JUST TOOK OFF HIS PANTS IN FRONT OF EVERYONE HOW DOES THAT MAKE SENSE' when I watched the Tokyo movie made me do this. Seriously! Just ripped off his clothes! Poof dressed in costume. WHAT? C'mon, at least throw in a wolf whistle or something.

As for Trickster, ever seen the JLU episode Flash and Substance? You can look it up on youtube, there are a few references in here regarding him. Gotta love the guy. "Wanna throw some darts?" As for Charlie, he's just some minor made up character who was in the _wrong place _at the _wrong time._

* * *

"_Want a bite?"_

That question had endless possibilities. Jinx would have been a very happy camper if it had been nonchalant. Jinx could match nonchalant. She could _surpass _nonchalant. She was wearing _sunglasses._

But the question was not nonchalant. Maybe, just maybe, if Wally had been leaning against the elevator wall, hands in the pockets of ratty jeans wearing a suddenly appearing leather jacket and Jinx's sunglasses, it could have passed, barely, for coolly offhand. But as it was, Wally was not wearing any of those things. Of course, he didn't have the loud Flash sweatshirt on anymore, but that was only because Jinx was wearing it.

Which brought her back to her problem. There wasn't an iota of indifference anywhere in Wally's expression. Yet again to her dismay, he had decided to Get Serious. Why he decided to do this by accosting her in an elevator with a piece of pie was beyond her comprehension, but she wasn't going to ask him. She didn't seem to be able to vocalize much of anything at the moment. All she could do was stare upwards at him (how she missed those extra inches her boots gave her…) and feel like her sunglasses were going to melt off her face from his gaze. There was a kind of barely suppressed intensity there that made her wonder if he had eye beams or something ridiculous like that.

The fact that he was gripping the front of her sweatshirt like he had no intention of letting go anytime soon wasn't helping.

As her labored breathing cut harshly through the silence (was she out of shape?), Jinx tried not to glance down at his hand (he had nice hands…), or act like she noticed it at all (maybe if she ignored it, it would go away!). Also, if she looked down she might overbalance. She had just barely stopped herself from crashing into Wally, and she wasn't going to tempt fate. Fate was a total bitch who frequently engaged in catfights with Jinx. Jinx usually lost, and she wasn't above picking her fights.

As it was, if she was in one currently, she was losing. She wasn't pressed against Wally but that was just a consolation prize. She was still much, much too close for her tastes, and he was still much, much too perceptive for her comfort. She knew very well that after living surprisingly amiably with Kid Flash, deciding to call it quits right now was a bit sudden and irrational. And now she was worried she'd have to attempt to justify herself to him when she couldn't even justify herself to _herself. _

And what the crap did he mean by 'want a bite'? Of what? The pie or him?

Jinx hoped she was managing to hold up a blank expression (though probably not) and evaluated her options. The path of least resistance, and the one that she so dearly wanted to take, was to break his hold, whirl around, and press frantically at the Door Open button, thus avoiding the confrontation that she had been running from. It was also the choice that her mind was pointing to frantically, because all her mental alarms were going off. '_Mayday, mayday, danger, Will Robinson, abort, abort, abandon ship!' _said the smart, cowardly part of Jinx. The crazy part of Jinx was telling her to just take the goddamn pie and be done with it. And Jinx the slut was telling her that she most certainly _did _want a bite.

Unfortunately for all of these, the part of Jinx that rose to the surface was the part of her that rallied against being forcibly dragged _anywhere. _

Wally watched shock, despair, panic, irritation, and something else unidentifiable chase each other across Jinx's face. They convened and fought a glorious, brutal battle a few centimeters above her nose before Jinx finally seemed to make up her mind. He actually kicked into hyperspeed for a moment to watch it all in slow-motion. It was pretty entertaining.

The only things obstructing his view from being complete were the sunglasses. Those would have to go—not permanently, but as often as possible.

The only warning Wally got was a slight perturbed downturn of her lips before her hand shot out to grab the fork in the pie, probably to stab him with, and that just wouldn't be any good at all, now would it?

Never mind that Wally was holding onto her with one hand and holding the plate with the other. The hand holding the plate disappeared in a blur and was underneath the plate again, clenched protectively around the fork, before the plate could even _think _about falling to the floor. Gravity, rather like Jinx, just wasn't fast enough. "I don't think so," he said.

"Well, at least you're learning," she said dryly. "Now, mind explaining what this is all about, pie-boy?" She would have shifted her weight onto one foot and maybe cocked her hip, but she was trying not to fall flat on her face, or, worse, on Wally. She had to remove the hand. Hoping to catch him by surprise, both her hands grabbed onto his and pried with all their might.

It didn't budge.

Jinx knew enough about breaking someone's hold to write several essays. No, really, she could. Many an assignment back at the Hive Academy had gone like that. However, there weren't many she could execute without causing some amount of pain. And she didn't want to seem like the hand was bothering her. The goal was to remove it from her person without seeming like she cared, and—

Oh damn it, he was smirking at her.

"After you," he said. "Because your decision to suddenly leave when you have no place to go has absolutely _nothing _to do with the fact that you're starting to realize how much a secret identity matters, right?"

_Okay, enough with the 'no place to go.' Make my situation sound helpless, why don't you._ "Absolutely," she said. The teeter totter of fight or flight was starting to tip. Flight looked a lot more appealing. It was like everyone was quite happily balancing towards fight, and then someone on the flight side shot someone on the fight side and used their corpse to tip the scales. This was heavy stuff. She did _not _want to get into this.

"And," he said, looking like he was quite aware that she couldn't extricate herself from his grip and still maintain a modicum of dignity (in other words infuriatingly smug), "You wouldn't be bothered at all to know mine, and you aren't affected at all by the fact that I trust you with my life?"

God. He trusted her with more than that. He trusted her with the lives of his loved ones. That meant a _lot _more than trusting someone with his own life.

Jinx gave up on her own attempt at nonchalance at this. "But you _shouldn't,_" she said before she could stop herself.

His eyebrows shot up at that. Jinx wanted to smack herself. She would need a highly coordinated team of surgeons to extricate her foot from her mouth when all this was over. And then she would need a band-aid and a star sticker and a balloon and a basket of cookies and maybe a pony before she stopped bawling.

"Maybe," he allowed, shrugging.

Oh, sure. _Now _he wanted to play it cool. _Not with pie,_ thought Jinx, _Not with pie in an _elevator.

But there it was. He wasn't smiling anymore. "But I do. And I think you need that right now."

His hand slowly released her sweatshirt and pulled down her sunglasses for the second time that day so he was meeting her gaze square on. _Why _did he have to keep doing that? By all rights, _he _should have been the one squirming at this, as Jinx had always thought she had quite off-putting eyes, disconcerting at all the right times and all the wrong ones. But instead she found herself realizing that this was almost worse than the sweatshirt thing. She tried to keep herself occupied by brushing off her sweatshirt in an annoyed manner.

She was still meeting his gaze when he started talking again. "And I'm still trying, alright? I'm trying not to scare you away. But I guess I didn't do that very well, and I can't really stop you, so if you want to leave, go ahead."

Here he let his hand drop, and Jinx didn't move a muscle, because she might falter if she tried to roll back on her heels too quickly. It wasn't like she had a lot of room to get away, anyway.

And all she could think was that it was all so horribly, miserably _unfair._

Really. She had been so close to getting away. And then, because of a bit of indignity, she just _had _to face Wally West down. That had been mistake number one. She would have been better off just ripping the sweatshirt in half Hulk-style and not breaking her stride toward the door. Because now he had _baited _her. And she _had _to respond to that.

Not for the first time in her life, Jinx eyed his neck and wondered how many of her problems she could solve if she knew how to use the Vulcan nerve pinch.

"Excuse me," she said, finally taking a moment to catch her footing. "Scare me away?"

Hook, line, and sinker- mistake number two.

"It's not like I blame you," he said, half grinning. "I _do _have a lot of enemies. If they knew you were hanging around me, or might even have a _clue _as to who I am, well…"

Her eyes narrowed. Okay, he was laying it on a bit thick. "Right. And _I _don't have any enemies to speak of."

He shrugged a bit, eyes half-mast. "Well, I can't say I know for sure, but-"

She knew, at that point, that he was going to slip into cocky superhero mode and say something that was going to piss her off enough that she'd have to go be a car hobo just on principal. She cast about for something to forestall him and, once again, her attention was drawn to the fork. She yanked it away from him, and this time he didn't stop her, instead pausing in the middle of getting ready to say something and shooting her a questioning look.

She smirked. Then she got a forkful of key lime pie and shoved it in his mouth.

"Mmf," he said.

Her smirk widened. It was nice to tilt someone else off-balance for a change.

_Ding. _The elevator slid to a stop. Jinx and Wally both blinked a bit, not having been aware it had started moving in the first place. The doors slid open.

A somewhat perplexed-looking couple stood on the other side, unsure as to what they had just intruded on. Elevator pie-feeding? Was this some kind of weird, popular new fetish?

"Oh," said Jinx cheerily. "This is our floor."

The fork slid against Wally's teeth as she pulled it out of his mouth. She pushed up her sunglasses, took his pie, and left the elevator. He followed, in somewhat of a daze.

"This isn't our floor," he said.

"We're taking the stairs."

Wally resisted the overpowering urge to burst into a rousing victory disco. Operation: Retrieve Jinx was a glorious success. Now, to see if he could ruin it by smarting off.

"So," he said, climbing the stairs next to her. "You hand-fed me pie. Does that mean you _like_ me, like me?"

She rolled her eyes. "Listen, pie-boy," she said, making a stabbing motion in his direction with the fork. "I'm staying for one reason and one reason only, and don't you forget it. Hell, maybe not even one reason. I don't even know _why _I'm staying, except maybe you'd never stop badgering me otherwise."

"You know you like it," he teased, and hopped down a step when she tried to spear him with her eating utensil.

"Don't you forget who has the weapon here, Wally, or-"

"Uh…" He cut her off and then paused for a moment on the stairs, looking as if he had just remembered something he would rather forget.

"What do you mean, 'uh'? I don't like the sound of that."

The sound of a door opening and raucous laughter filled the stairwell. Wally shook his head. "Apartment," he said.

She nodded and they climbed past a loud group of people, walking down the hallway without further comment. When they got to the door, they both stared down at the lock, which seemed to be oozing liquid metal.

"Yeah, I'm gonna get you a key to use," said Wally.

"Shut up. I was in a hurry," said Jinx. She opened the door, carefully avoiding the oozy parts, and trudged into the apartment. Defeated, she threw her bag on the couch, and dragged herself into the kitchen. She took a seat on the counter and ate the pie. If she was staying, she might as well enjoy the benefits.

Wally strolled in and stood next to her, leaning against the counter. He turned his head to look at her, sighed, and shoved his hands in his pockets. "Here's the thing," he said. "The police are kind of pinning the necklace theft on you…"

"Kind of?"

"Okay, they are. But…"

She interjected, feeling a bit of incredulity take root in her stomach. "So what? You brought me back here to arrest me?" she asked him, expression frank, tensing on the counter. She almost reached the door out of the place and she walked all the way back just to learn this? She was starting to consider the window as a viable option this time. The incredulity plant flowered into mild panic, and she smiled without humor. "Have you gotten to know me enough to take me to jail yet?"

He crossed his arms at her. "I'm not going to take you in."

She laughed on reflex, probably out of relief. "Not taking in a wanted criminal. Wow, what kind of superhero _are_ you?"

"The nice kind," he said, smiling.

For some reason, Jinx seemed to decide this was the wrong answer. She hopped down off the counter and flung the plate to the side. It landed on the counter with a clatter. "So," she said, tossing him a look under her eyelashes that he missed completely, "is this where I express my _eternal _gratitude? Just so you know, it probably doesn't count if I try the hero thing because you've hedged me into it. Is that what you're trying to do?" Her words were sarcastic but misleadingly calm, belied by the sudden appearance of a crack in one of the sunglasses lenses. Pink light filtered dimly through the crack.

"_No_," Wally hissed leaning forward, so vehemently that Jinx blinked in surprise and the light vanished. He seemed to realize how loudly he'd spoken, because he rocked back on his heels and sighed, running a hand through his hair in agitation. "No," he repeated more gently. "I just… wanted to tell you. Alright? I know you didn't do it, so there's no point in arresting you. And I wanted you to find out from me and not some news broadcast. So you know to be careful."

A 'sorry' was dancing on the tip of her tongue. She swallowed it, and it burned on the way down. "Careful? Well, that's no fun," she said, more lightly than she felt. She picked up her plate and went to wash it. Of course, he intercepted it again and cleaned it at super-speed, but she was too tired to argue with him over her washing territory. He wanted to be Mr. Housewife Man-Bitch Extraordinaire, he could go right ahead.

She realized her thoughts were darkening again and sighed, walking out of the room. She made a beeline for the couch and picked up the hedgehog and its bed of Wally's-ex-sweatshirt scraps, putting the whole bundle on the coffee table. Then she flopped onto the couch, face-first.

She heard Wally's footsteps, before hearing him sit down on the coffee table. His knees were brushing one of the couch cushions. A moment of silence, and then the sound of rustling fabric. Wally had discovered the hedgehog's new 'bed.' "…Was this the sweatshirt I gave you this morning?"

"It had an accident," Jinx said into the pillow her face was smothered in.

"You know, if you wanted the one I was wearing that bad, you could have just asked. Though I'm sure you enjoyed the… creative way you acquired the one you have now."

She laughed a bit. "You wish," she said. Then she turned her head to look at him, arms twined around the pillow under her, seized by the sudden urge to explain herself. She hesitated slightly. "Look… I know I'm kind of… homicidal right now. It's just… you have so much leverage, you know?"

Wally toyed with the edges of her sweatshirt, which was rather distracting, but he was obviously listening. "Leverage?"

Jinx pulled the sunglasses off of her face and stuck her tongue out at the cracked lens, throwing the broken object aside and lying back down on the pillow. She made a face. "Leverage. I want everything to be my choice… and I feel like I can't do that if you have the upper hand. Like I'm only doing it because there's nothing else I can do."

"I won't ever use my knowledge against you. You don't need to feel like that." He smiled a bit and nudged her shoulder, deciding to change the subject because he couldn't prove that to her without more time. "Hey! I just remembered…"

He disappeared and reappeared with Jinx's old friend, the horribly puffy evil coat of doom in hand. "You forgot your coat," he said.

Jinx groaned. Her boss was truly a sadist. Jinx had gone to the lengths of beating Wally up to get out of wearing it. She earned the right to get rid of it. Why did he have to bring it back? "Let me burn that thing, will you?"

His eyes took on a teasing glint. "What, you don't like it? It's pink and everything."

She gave him a blank look. Then she started acting a bit strange, fidgeting a bit. She seemed like she had something to say and was arguing with herself over it. Wally instantly decided to worm it out of her somehow. It was one of his favorite new games. He had a lot of those now. The current running champion was Get Felt Up By Jinx, although he supposed she would make indignant noises about only wanting to do the whole wallet-distraction routine if he brought it up. She probably thought he wasn't going to bring it up again, but she was _very _wrong. He wouldn't be done with that one for a _long _time.

He waved the jacket a little. "Is it the wrong shade of pink or something?"

Here it was. She responded automatically, which was always a good thing for him. It meant he was going to win the game. By the time she turned her brain-to-mouth filter back on it would be too late.

"I wouldn't know," she said. "I'm colorblind."

Beat.

She made a strangled sound and buried her head in the pillow. When she resurfaced, her hair was sticking up at odd angles and she had a disbelieving kind of look in her eyes. "I did not just say that. You didn't hear it. You didn't hear _anything._"

"Oh, but I _did,_" he said, grinning from ear to ear. This was better than he had expected. "Are you really? How did you make your outfit, then?"

Jinx flopped back onto the pillow momentarily, let off an unintelligible string of swears, and looked up again. Then she took a calming breath, and let it out in a resigned manner. Well, she'd done it again. Damage control was a lost cause. "Kind of," she said. "As for the outfit, I asked. As for the color, it's… complicated."

He gave her an are-you-kidding-me look. "Try me."

She gave him a fine-be-that-way-smartass look. "I have a kind of red-green colorblindness. It's what cats have. I think there was a word for it…"

"Deuteranopia."

She blinked, surprised. "Yeah, that's it."

He smiled. "Lot of time on my hands," he reminded her by way of explanation.

"Apparently." The corner of her mouth twitched. "Anyway… there's not much to explain. I always knew I could see better in the dark than other people, and I knew that my vision got a bit blurry up close, but it took me a while to notice that people called colors that looked white to me 'green,' and things that just looked dark 'red.' It wasn't until I got to the HIVE that anyone really explained it to me."

Wally nodded. "And you can't fix your near vision with glasses because it's a problem with how many cone receptors you have in your retina… a sampling grain issue, and not an issue of whether your lenses are too strong or weak."

She was a bit flabbergasted. She had been counting on giving him an abridged version of an explanation and not going into details so she wouldn't have to explain anything, but apparently she didn't need to anyway. "Yeah, so I just don't hover too close to the paper when I draw…" she said weakly, trailing off. "Wow, you weren't kidding, were you?"

"Nope. And they said reading an entire library was a waste of time."

She shook her head. "And now you have some more leverage. I don't believe it."

"Hey, you know _my _secret identity. That's leverage. Or have you forgotten who you're talking to?"

She groaned. "I'm _trying_ to forget that. I'm afraid I'll do the wrong thing. You don't even know what kind of person I'll be in the future. What will you do then? Why do you even trust me _now_?"

He laughed with genuine hopelessness. "I honestly don't know," he said, then lowered his voice, like he was imparting a scandalous secret. "And I think you're more afraid you'll do the right thing."

She narrowed her eyes at him. "No one asked you, pie-boy." She was about to commence with beating him senseless with a pillow in the hopes that he would acquire amnesia, when an annoyed look passed over Wally's face. He lifted his shirt a bit, unhooked the Titans communicator, waved, and was gone.

Jinx stared at the place Kid Flash had just vacated for a while, trying to come to terms with how the _hell _she had slipped up _again. _It just wasn't funny anymore. It had never been funny to _begin _with.

What _was _it about this guy that made her mouth function two steps ahead of her brain at all times? She couldn't believe she had let that one slip. It was a piece of information that she… hadn't guarded, really, just failed to mention for a long time until it became, by exclusion, a secret. She hadn't planned it that way. If it had come up, she was sure she would have told her team. But she had always viewed it as a minor kind of detail. It was just one of those quirks some people had, like mild scoliosis or really bad vision or two different-colored eyes or slight deafness in one ear. This was hers.

It didn't really bother her, not even when she was driving, except occasionally at night, when green lights were, to her, just another white pinprick among numerous headlights and streetlamps. So she figured it was unimportant. Thus, it never came up, and it never got talked about. It wasn't like she could have just woken up one morning, gathered her team and went, 'Oh hey, by the way, I'm colorblind.' For one thing, she wasn't sure she would have been able to hold their attention that long. For another, then she'd have to spend another forty minutes explaining that _no, _she didn't just see in black and white, it didn't _work _that way, she could see blue verses other colors just fine, she just had problems with the red through brown through green continuum, and then she'd probably give up around the half-hour mark anyway.

So it had become one of those little details that were just big enough not to mention in casual conversation or upon meeting, and somehow never got the chance to be mentioned. The ones that you say you wouldn't mind talking about, really, except the stretch of time where there was no opportunity to mention it became so long that when the opportunity _did _arise, people would be amazed that they hadn't known it for so long, and it wasn't really worth the effort anyway.

So, with the exception of some HIVE faculty, Jinx had been the sole possessor of that little secret for quite a long time. SeeMore or Kid Wykkyd might have guessed at it, but even that was unlikely. And now she had just given away that secret to Kid Flash, or Wally West, or whoever he was, and it was bothering her, even though she had always told herself it was unimportant, unimportant, unimportant…

Still, from time to time she had nightmares about her enemies giving her a white door and a green door (both looking the same to her, of course), telling her that the white door held freedom and the green one death, and making her choose.

But she was sure that was just her subconscious being silly.

"So," she said conversationally to the hedgehog who had just emerged from his blanket of fabric scraps. "I didn't make _too _much of an ass of myself, did I?"

The hedgehog snuffled at her noncommittally and burrowed back into his bed, turning his back on her.

Jinx groaned and flopped onto the pillow for the last time. It was official. Even the hedgehog was disgusted with her. She needed some sleep. Thoughts of white doors and the scattered information she had obtained when learning about her own eyesight drifted through her head before somewhere along the way, she slipped into slumber.

While she was sleeping, she began to dream. It was a good dream. Not hideously complicated or intellectually stimulating or symbolic or anything like that, but definitely a good dream. It was just a hazy sort of impression of comfort and warmth and a very nice room. Also, endless shirtless men, forever.

It was at a particularly comfortable, warm, nice part of the dream in which she was being fed something delicious, probably pie or birthday cake, that she received a rude awakening. It came in the form of one of her male attendants leaning close and parting his lips slightly, like someone preparing to speak, only executed more sexily. As it turned out, he was. What he said was this:

"Ring. Riing."

Jinx awoke not so much with a start as with an immense feeling of disappointment. The phone ringing wasn't a rude awakening in the sense that it was sudden. It was just rude in the sense that generally, dreams filled with shirtless men weren't the ones you wanted to end early, unless of course it was one of those dreams that started out nice and shirtless and degenerated into a nightmare when one of the people in it turned into a crazed, frustrated tech support agent who proceeded to pull out a twelve-inch carving knife and start killing everyone. Jinx had actually had a dream like that before. It hadn't been pleasant, and she dearly wished that a phone had interrupted _that _dream instead of her more recent one.

It figured. Jinx wedged herself more firmly into the couch and ignored the ringing for about two seconds before some deep, hidden, domestic must-answer-ringing-phone syndrome sent her leaping to her feet and dashing, rather unsteadily, round the apartment in search of the phone.

She hadn't even noticed the phone before, but she swiftly found the base of it in the kitchen. Unfortunately, the phone itself wasn't in its cradle, and by the time she located the source of the ringing (inside a box of Cheerios in a kitchen cabinet) the ringing ceased.

Jinx was left feeling cheated and deeply offended, standing in the middle of the kitchen, holding a silent phone and a box of Cheerios, with only the fast-disappearing remnants of her dream to comfort her.

"I hate you," she informed the phone with real malice.

The phone remained silent, snootily.

She gave it one last dirty look, slammed it down on its cradle, tossed the Cheerios in a cabinet, and tottered off to go lay back down. Of course, the moment she resituated herself and was starting to drift off again, the phone resumed its ringing.

Jinx lurched off the couch and made a valiant dash for the kitchen, vowing not to be defeated again. She swooped the phone up and pressed the 'talk' button with a victorious flourish. "Hello?"

"Rebecca? It's Wally."

Jinx made an unhappy noise, which Wally found rather insulting. "You woke me up," she complained. "I was having a really nice dream." She had a right, she reasoned, to be bitchy after being woken up from such a nice dream. The only way Wally could make it up to her was to lose the shirt whenever he was in the apartment, and she wasn't sure if that was a very, very good idea or a very bad one.

"Bet I was in it."

Jinx actually couldn't remember. Had he? Hmmm… "No, see, it was nice because you _weren't._ That was the whole dream. And you owe me for ruining it."

"Okay, okay, and now I'm going to owe you a bit more." Wally's voice lowered. "I need a favor…"

"A favor? You'll be my indentured servant for weeks."

"Oh, come on. It's the least you can do after you molested me."

Jinx's jaw dropped, the visual effect of which was lost on the phone. "I did _not _molest you! I was going for your _wallet! _And if you'll recall, that all worked out-"

He cut her off. "Okay, okay. But I'd really appreciate it. I've got my hands full right about now, and… well… there's this guy at this bar… and I kind of need you to baby-sit him."

"Is this guy… what, a criminal or something? And I need to watch him until you get back?" Jinx rubbed at her face, trying to banish her fatigue, and waited for Wally to elaborate. She wasn't agreeing until she knew what she was getting into.

"Not exactly…" Wally trailed off, and Jinx started to feel curiosity take root, which was a Very Bad Thing. Jinx, due to her extensive training in information-gathering, had a natural dispensation to be curious. And because she was curious now, chances were she would agree to this just to figure out what was going on.

In other words, she was nosy. "Then why the need for a chaperone?"

"Well, James is… He's a great guy, really, and I wouldn't even say he commits _crimes, _but right now he's just… off his meds."

She laughed. When no further noise came from the phone, she stopped and became very worried. "You're serious."

"Yeah. Calls himself the Trickster. I'd take him back to the hospital or just tell him to turn himself in, and he'd do it, all I have to do is promise to visit and play darts with him, but he's kind of unpredictable at the moment. Not to mention very slightly drunk. And he has enough problems without getting in trouble for under-aged drinking—he's our age—so I figured I'd just keep him out of trouble and let him sleep it off, and then take him back to the hospital. Only there's another little problem I need to take care of downtown, and it'll take a while, even for me." He said this all in one very quick breath, and silence reigned over the phone connection after he'd finished while Jinx tried to process it all.

"You're too nice for your own good," she said finally.

"Aww, thanks. And I need to get back into my uniform and away from the bar, so can you do it? It's Ricky's Martini Hub; wear your uniform, and all you have to do is keep him out of trouble for a while?"

_Ricky's Martini Hub?_ She'd do it, but she was going to milk it for all it was worth. "What's in it for me?"

"My eternal gratitude."

Jinx made a noise that told him exactly what she thought of his eternal gratitude and where he could stuff it.

"And…" he continued, "I'll tell you where I parked your car."

Her mouth dropped open. She hadn't even thought about her car, or the fact that Kid Flash never told her where it was parked. She had just kind of assumed it would be waiting for her in the parking lot like those pets who tracked down their families after getting lost thousands of miles away. But, now that she thought about it, she _had _left Kid Flash in it with the engine running… "That's… That's _devious,_" she said.

He gave a dark chuckle, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. _Damn. _He couldn't be a champion of justice and yet an excellent blackmailer at the same time. And yet he _could. _That was just unfair. But kind of sexy… Indecision!

"Guess you're rubbing off on me," he teased.

"Alright, genius, then if I don't have my car, how am I going to get to _Ricky's Martini Hub?_"

"I'll tell you what. You get the car once you agree to help. If you follow through, and _only _if you follow through, I'll tell you about that card you wanted me to check out."

Her breath caught. Ooh, that was a low blow. Yet another bit of unfairness. Kid Flash was an idiot, and yet surprisingly intelligent. "Whatever happened to all that trust you had in me?" she asked, tone light, twirling a lock of her hair coquettishly. He couldn't see her, but Jinx figured it still lent some authenticity to her performance.

"I trust you," he said, "But I've also _met_ you."

"Touché."

"So you're in?"

She sighed. "Whatever."

"Great, thanks!" he said, like she had agreed of her own volition and not because she was being bribed and blackmailed. She would have been somewhat pleasantly surprised by the warm tone, except she also had that feeling she got when Kid Flash was smiling but she couldn't see it. Her suspicions were confirmed when he went on. "Your car's across the street from the front of the building. You can probably see it out the window."

Her mouth dropped open and she rushed over to the window, pushing the blinds aside. "Ugh, I _can!_" How had she missed that?

"The keys are in my room, on the bed. Take Lawrence Street west for five lights, turn right, and keep going until you see it. It'll be on your left. Trickster's the only guy in there who looks like a fabric shop threw up on him." And he disconnected.

Jinx put the phone onto its base and let her head flop back as if to ask 'why me?' No one stepped forward to answer that, so she gave up on asking and went to change. Two minutes later she was all dressed up and ready to kick ass and chew gum, only she was all out of—

"Oh, wait, no, here's some," she said. She pulled it out of her coat pocket and popped it into her mouth. Okay, _now _she was out of gum.

She tiptoed her way into Wally's room, purposefully acting uninterested and resisting the urge to go snooping around. She successfully sent an angry mental mob to kill the voice that told her to make herself at home on his bed and retrieved the keys. Then she grabbed a change of clothes just for the hell of it, and hid her uniform under the coat. There was no way to hide her hair short of a very large babushka, so she took the stairs and exited via the service door.

She crossed the street and only had one near-death experience while doing it- a personal best for her. So she only gave her traitor car a _slightly _dirty look before stowing her civilian clothes and coat in the trunk and hopping in.

The ride to the bar (_Martini Hub_) was largely uneventful, despite the fact that Jinx almost mowed down a few pedestrians, but that always happened. This was because the people in Jump City walked like they drove: They ignored any and all signs and lights, ran out into the middle of the street, and just hoped they didn't get hit. Also, they swore a lot. The entirety of the city could be blindfolded and traffic would probably be the same.

The worst part was the parking. The situation wasn't as bad in other cities, but if you were smart or a local you just used public transportation. Parking prices had been rising steadily, and if you didn't know where the meters were you were doomed.

For Jinx, public transportation wasn't exactly an option. She found that she could drive around without being arrested for the most part, since other drivers didn't care who she was as long as she didn't block traffic, and people were surprisingly willing to look in the other direction if she wasn't causing any mayhem. They were all too willing to doubt their own senses and think it was just someone in costume doing a publicity stunt rather than a genuine supervillain. However, getting on a train just took it a little bit too far.

Thus why when she got to Ricky's Martini Hub (Who the hell had _named _the bar, anyway? Probably Ricky, obviously, but still…) and all the parking spaces were occupied, she didn't hesitate for a moment before pulling into an alley, turning on her blinkers and exiting the car. Hopefully she could get in, grab this Trickster guy, or James or whatever, and manhandle him into her car before any cross traffic tried to get through or a cop came and wrote her up. She'd done it before with some success, so she just had to hope she got… lucky.

She was so screwed.

Better make this quick, then. She swung into the building. A few glances were thrown her way but no one paid her much mind. She didn't need an ID to get in, only to drink, so there shouldn't be any problems with her getting thrown out. This way she didn't have to go digging around in her glove compartment for the fake one she kept, for sentimental reasons more than anything else. How weird was that? Some kids put their soccer trophies on display. Jinx kept her first fake ID in the glove compartment.

She didn't even need to look around for him. The Trickster _did _look like a fabric shop had thrown up on him. He also looked like he was going to throw up himself, but that was another matter entirely. He was seated at a barstool, hunched over the bar, with his cape dangling listlessly from his shoulders. His outfit was all bright oranges and yellows and blues, the stripes and spots thrown together haphazardly to form perhaps one of the ugliest uniforms she had ever seen in her life. Forget Raven. This guy had serious fashion issues.

She slid onto the stool next to him and noted the mask across his eyes and his wild, spiky hair, blonde with pink chunks dyed into it. She also noted the half-empty glass in front of him. Manners be damned, she grabbed it and slid it away from him. It was probably alcoholic. Woo-hoo, look at her go, stopping under-aged drinking. She was a regular freakin' girl scout. McGruff would be proud. "Trickster?"

He looked up at her sulkily. "Who are you?"

"Your babysitter. Your buddy Kid Flash sent me to cart you out of here, so come on." She decided that if he asked why she was helping a superhero, she would make up some outrageous lie or just knock him out and stuff him in her trunk.

Unfortunately, Trickster didn't seem to be in a get-up-and-move mood. He seemed to be in more of a sigh-and-mope mood. For a second, he flashed a sad smile. "What a great guy. You know, he's always looking out for me. Even after I pushed him into that vat of fake vomit."

That startled a laugh out of her. She pictured it, and laughed some more. She'd have to bring that up sometime. Her eyes were softer from the mirth, and she decided she liked this guy. He seemed inept enough to evoke pet ownership feelings, similar to those inspired by her team. "Jinx," she introduced herself, holding out a hand.

"I know you. You're that girl that robbed the museum." Jinx decided not to correct him (she _had _tried), keeping her hand steady. Trickster aimed for her hand and missed. He looked confused for a moment, tried again, and mysteriously found his hand grabbing his drink back from Jinx. He looked at it for a moment, seemed to decide to himself, 'well, this will end badly, but who am I to argue with fate?,' and took a sip. Then he decided the sip might be lonely and sent another sip to keep it company, and another one because with only two of them it might get awkward, and then of course he had to take a big gulp-

"I think that's enough," said Jinx, who had been watching with a kind of incredulous stupefaction. She took the glass away from him again, took a sip, and started coughing. "What the heck are you drinking?"

He tried to take it back and cradle it to his chest defensively, but only managed to knock over a bowl of bar nuts. "It's lemonade," he said.

She set the glass down with a thunk and a disgusted expression. "You mean one percent lemonade, ninety nine percent Jack Daniel's? You need to learn to mix your drinks properly." She dragged him off the bar stool.

Trickster seemed to snap out of whatever funk he'd been in. He flashed her a cheery smile, suddenly all hyperactive ADD. "Ooh, where we goin'?"

Jinx led him out of the building and into the evening air, shrugging. "I don't know. I guess I could take you to a movie theater and stash you there until you pass out, and then put you in the back seat- hey!"

Sure enough, there was a police cruiser double-parked in front of the bar, and an officer was standing by her car, writing her up and shaking his head. Normally, the sight of a cop made Jinx's anxiety level skyrocket, but this guy was special. Jinx knew him. He had been assigned to tail her once, and she had broken his gun. He'd also been wearing an ankle holster in addition to what he normally had at the time. After watching him hop around one foot, swearing, before falling on his ass, Jinx had summarily decided that he was her favorite cop _ever._

His name was Charles Spencer. He was probably in his early thirties, had short brown hair, and made quite a spectacularly depressed face when he saw Jinx. When Jinx was around, his cruiser and his person tended to take on damage, and both the car and himself were pretty banged up already.

"Charles!" said Jinx, marching up to him with Trickster in tow and smiling like he was an old friend. "_Charlie_."

"I should have known it was you," he said. "Look. I'm going to turn around. You just march back wherever you came from, I'll finish writing this ticket, and leave. No one gets hurt."

He was trying to make it sound like he was cutting her a deal, but the bottom line was, Jinx had powers and he didn't, and he'd rather leave her to those who were likewise gifted.

Jinx smiled as if she was a shark and Charles was a seal. "Afraid of a little confrontation?"

The baiting worked. It always did. No little teenaged waif was going to insult Charlie and get away with it. "Now listen, young lady," he said, trying to appear like an invincible authority figure. "A lot of people are looking for you, and-" Suddenly, he lunged for her.

Jinx, who had gone halfway into the catatonic stupor she slid into whenever Charles started with one of his lectures that ended with a failed attempt to arrest her, was taken by surprise. Charlie grabbed her shoulder and pressed a stun gun firmly into her forehead.

Nothing happened.

Charlie's brow knotted a bit, and he pressed at the trigger to the stun gun again. Nothing. He pulled it away and squinted at it. Jinx thought, what the heck, and leaned over to look at it. It looked like a perfectly good stun gun.

"Goddamn piece of crap," he said, shaking the stun gun a bit.

"Check the batteries," suggested Jinx.

"I just changed those!"

Trickster held out his hand. "Here, let me see. I'm good with that kind of stuff."

Charlie handed it over. Trickster messed around with it for a bit. He finally settled for just hitting it and hoping that would somehow fix it, and Charlie put his head in his hands.

"Ah-ha!" said Trickster triumphantly. He pressed the trigger and pushed the stun gun into Charlie's shoulder. Charlie made a kind of squeaking noise and crumpled to the ground.

Jinx and Trickster looked down at Charlie for a moment.

"Oops," said Trickster sheepishly. "Well, turns out he forgot about the safety switch."

Jinx blew out a breath. "Well, great. We can't just leave him here. I'm willing to bet there are a ton of villains in that bar. They'd massacre him."

And the police cruiser was impeding traffic. There was only one thing for it, especially since Jinx was _not _trusting Trickster with driving a car.

"Watch him," she told Trickster. Then she got into her car and pulled up behind the cruiser. There were a few people exiting the bar. They gave Trickster and the cop some odd looks, before deciding that they'd better leave. Luckily, this meant Jinx could park. She pulled into a space, got out, and locked up her car.

She fed some change from Charlie's pockets into the meter. Then Trickster and Jinx took on the monumental task of manhandling Charlie into the backseat of his cruiser. They banged his head against the doorway a few times by accident, but he couldn't feel it anyway. When that was done, Jinx handcuffed him and tossed his gun and his ankle holster on the floor in front of the passenger seat. She and Trickster slid into the front, Jinx driving. She pulled away from the line of parked cars, cut off a taxi, and grinned like a maniac.

"I always wanted to drive one of these," she admitted. She supposed that the only downside was that people would drive the speed limit around her now.

"Ooh, ooh! Put the flashy lights on," Trickster suggested.

"Later," said Jinx. It'd be best if they avoided broadcasting that Charlie wasn't driving this car any sooner than necessary.

In the back, Charlie was making some groaning zombie-esque noises. "What happened?" he asked groggily.

"You passed out," said Jinx. "Must have low blood sugar or something. Listen, you just go back to sleep so we don't have to put you in the trunk."

Charlie groaned. "And why does my head hurt…?"

Jinx waved a hand dismissively. "You probably hit your head on the ground."

"And what…" Some jangling noises from the back. "Are these my handcuffs?!"

Jinx and Trickster looked at each other. Then Trickster looked away, whistling, and Jinx let out a drawn-out, innocent "Noooooo…"

"They _are, _aren't they?" Charlie made some more rattling noises. "If you don't take these off me I'm going to jump out the door!"

"Wow, nothing gets past you, huh? Give that boy a _medal! _And…" Jinx swerved around a turning van; horns blared, brakes squealed, and the crazy grin on her face curved at the edges. "You wanna jump out? Be my guest." She unlocked the doors.

The cop's dismayed groan filled the car, and the two lunatics up front laughed. So much for an uneventful night.

* * *

End A/N: This is obviously some strange meaning of the phrase "out of trouble" that Wally wasn't previously aware of. (Hitchhiker's Guide FTW!) Aww, but she's just trying to make sure no one's double-parked in front of Ricky's Martini Hub. (Kudos for the name goes to my beta, 3) She's only taking them to see a movie or something, I swear. Unless something better comes along… -evil laugh-

FINALLY, go to my profile and check out my 'homepage.' It's a link to this post on a community on livejournal I found while link-hopping around randomly. If you ever need to say "I'll strangle her today" or "Point the barrel the other way" in Hindi, IT WILL TEACH YOU.

Reviewers, you know the drill. Do whatever you want. You've been so wonderful so far. I'M OVER THE 150 REVIEWS MARK! I need to draw you people something… Now, it's time for my Super Beta to beat me off my soapbox:

E/N: If there is naming to be done in this story, it will be mine. Mark my words, ye readership, and mark them well! Oh, and contrary to what Re-Ane thinks, these chapters are in fact getting longer. So it was well worth the wait, wasn't it?


	9. Eyyyy

A/N: I'm a jerk I am sorry. :C Please to be not killing me, have update.

Also! Someone finally pointed out that Jinx could see the neon pink jacket before, and now I'm going with a color blind story… Why? Because I am incompetent! Sorry. I mean, I can _mention _that things are neon pink without mentioning that Jinx _knows _that they're neon pink, but I'm kind of… failing. Oh well.

* * *

Unsurprisingly, Officer Charles (and not Officer Charliepants as Jinx and Trickster kept calling him) disdained the generous offer of a nice unlocked door to jump out of. He had been knocked out by two teenagers, one of which was dressed in _polka dots_ and _stripes._ Not only that, but he had been thrown in the back of his own cruiser while restrained with his own handcuffs. He really, really did not want to be discovered restrained and bloody in the middle of the road on top of all that. 

Also unsurprisingly, he spurted off yet more threats. Most of them involved arrest. Jinx went through a mini panic attack when she remembered she was supposed to make sure Trickster _didn't _get arrested, but remained cool and collected, shrugging off his comments with an acerbic reply or two. She'd be able to get Trickster the hook before this was all over. Because, really, they were just _borrowing _the cruiser. They weren't going to keep it or anything, and Charlie was right here… It was almost like he was letting them drive his car for fun! Except for the whole 'consent' thing… and the cuffs… and the unconsciousness… and the confiscating of his weapons… But really, it was all in lighthearted goodwill, to make sure that Charlie didn't end up mauled by the inhabitants of Ricky's Martini Hub, and his car didn't go untended.

Most unsurprisingly of all, Charlie did not see the merit in Jinx's… _unique _point of view, so Jinx let a few creative ideas simmer in her brain on low heat. Hopefully in a while they'd be well-done and ready to assist her in… _persuading_ Charlie to handily forget that Trickster ever rode shotgun in his stolen vehicle. She then refocused the mental facilities that had been preoccupied with worrying on making sure that Trickster didn't accidentally break something while playing with all the fun, shiny buttons and gadgets in Charlie's cruiser.

Surprisingly, Jinx's car drove past them.

Jinx's brain skipped a beat rather like the hearts of romance novel heroines. Charlie and Trickster immediately craned their necks to watch as it drove past, headed in the other direction, but it took Jinx a moment or two to get past 'Wait… what?' and twist around to gawk. There was no noticeable change in her driving despite the fact that she was looking at the wrong part of the road. "Was that…?"

"HA! Now you know how it feels," said Charlie, wiggling his hands ineffectually behind his back in glee.

"Hey, that guy had the same car as yours! Same color, too!" said Trickster, delighted.

That settled it. Jinx pulled an illegal U, made some rude hand gestures where it was necessary and accelerated. A block ahead of them, she saw the car turn a corner. Jinx stepped on it and nearly took the corner on two wheels.

"What do you think you're doing? Slow down!" Charlie was trying to keep himself upright without having arms. Trickster leaned into the back seat and buckled him in. Charlie gave him a sarcastic 'thank you.'

"SHIT!" Jinx slammed on the brakes. A van had managed to get between her and the red car. A little hunk of junk sedan was poking along right next to it, blocking the way to what she could have sworn was _her car_. She was positive she had locked up, but of course Jinx knew full well that sometimes locks weren't enough. Shame that she'd left her magic protection spells in her voodoo trunk back in Imagination Land.

It was also a shame that she was in a police cruiser. _Stop obeying the speed limit, damn you, _she thought at the slowpokes in front of her. Nothing slowed traffic like a cop, and _her car_ was pulling farther and farther away from them. Jinx had been planning on saving the sirens for later, but this might warrant trying them out a bit early.

"How do I turn on the sirens?" she asked, not wanting to press the wrong button and end up paging a police station or something.

"I'm not telling," said Charlie petulantly.

Well. So much for the sirens.

Jinx drove on with her teeth clenched and an angry twitch developing below her right eye. Jinx stole from other people. _No one _stole from Jinx. Especially when the stolen property in question was her car. This person, too, would pay, and they were getting bumped to the top of the 'people who are going to pay' list because they were the closest. She decided with certainty that she would knock them unconscious and make sure they woke up naked and chained to an angry rhinoceros, covered in peanut butter and inexplicably-

Trickster, in the midst of his shiny-buttons induced stupefaction, had somehow managed to get music to play. And he was singing along. Badly.

This was really not helping her mood.

"How do I shut it off?" Jinx groaned, thumping her head against the steering wheel.

"I don't even know how he turned it on," Charlie replied, sounding just as miserable. A bit of the animosity between them had dissipated in their shared misery. Honestly, despite everything, both of them found it hard to hate the other. "I didn't even know my car could play music."

Jinx whimpered and face-steering-wheel-ed again, accidentally beeping the horn. One of the jittery drivers in front of her jumped in their seat and decided that they had had enough of driving in front of a squad car. The sedan turned onto a side street and Jinx sped up triumphantly.

They caught up to Jinx's car two blocks later, only for Jinx to realize that it wasn't actually her car. The sides and back were scratched up and dented much worse than her car, for one thing, and the license plate was different. Which made sense- it had been coming from the opposite direction, although she hadn't exactly been thinking logically when she first saw it. Well, no huge loss. If one of the HIVE Five had been driving that car, there would be shouting and screaming and explosions coming from _somewhere _by now. It looked like Jinx had just found one of the missing cars from the HIVE Five garage.

This knowledge didn't calm her temper in the slightest. This was one of the miserable base-ruiners she was looking for. Well, this was a stroke of luck- she'd found them with very little effort on her part. Now she was going to beat them up, and she was going to find out their piece-of-crap reason for trashing the base. Then she was going to beat them up again. Then she was going to _laugh._

She noticed a bit of pink energy crackling along the steering wheel, and took a deep breath, making an effort to calm herself. Getting overemotional wouldn't do- she would just end up hexing something on accident, like the squad car, and then Charlie would never let her hear the end of it. _Now, what to do… I could try to follow them at a distance- no. This car sticks out too easily. I could try the sirens and see if they pull over like a good little criminal- ha. I could… I could roll down my window and ask nicely._

She followed the red car, not riding its bumper but not allowing any cars in between them either, taking more time to review her options, hoping they were freaked out by having a cop tail them. She found herself fantasizing about just pulling up and ramming the other car into a lamppost.

Trickster shot her a few worried looks out of the corner of his eye. Was she supposed to be all… crackly? And glowy? And homicidal? And was the car supposed to be making that ominous rumbling noise?

Jinx paid him no mind. She found, strangely, that she had pulled into the left lane, and was now traveling next to the red car. In an odd dreamlike state, she glanced over at the red car, almost casually. Heatwave was driving it. That _freak _with the flamethrower in the alley. She had a freaking scabbed-over _crater _in her side because of him. Well. It looked like he had managed to squirm his way out of the filthy dumpster she had dropped him in, shortly after knocking him unconscious. She wondered if he held a grudge. Really, he had no right, considering that _he _had ambushed _her._

"_The name's Heatwave… and you have something that doesn't belong to you."_

He was such a disgusting little _maggot._

Trickster was messing with the radio again. She heard the _click _of a button distantly, felt her control snap with it, tightened her hands to bone-white bands around the wheel, and rammed the police cruiser into the side of the little red car.

"ARE YOU OUTTA YOUR GODDAMN MIND?!" Charlie shouted.

Brakes squealed as Heatwave found his car jolted violently to the side and half-onto the curb before both vehicles came to a bone-jarring halt.

Jinx felt strangely detached while she watched Heatwave's shocked expression as he grappled for control of his car. It was as if her body had decided to go right ahead and do what she had been wanting to do, and her mind was trailing behind, not quite caught up again. Then, as her head snapped back and the motion ceased, everything was in real time again.

She flew out of the cruiser and clambered on top of it, jumping down onto the HIVE car's roof and then down to the sidewalk on the other side with the seamless grace of a dancer. Then she grabbed Heatwave by the front of his weird little uniform, hauled him out the passenger door he was trying to climb out of, and slammed him against the car again with the practiced ease of a professional.

"_You,_" he hissed, eyes going wide, confronted yet again with a nightmarish vision in pink. Before she could answer he shoved a repaired flamethrower in her gut and pulled the trigger.

She stumbled back with an oath and whipped the muzzle upwards with her palm, jerking it away when a fiery explosion rocked the air just inches from her hand, heat searing across her entire front. Her foot caught on a crack in the sidewalk as she tried to shield herself from the sudden cacophony of light and sound. A moment later she was blinking away the grainy after-images blotting out the world, sitting on the sidewalk with her ass smarting and instinctual tears blurring her vision.

All of a sudden Trickster was there, yanking her to her feet, shouting something over the ringing in her ears.

Through the dots swimming in front of her eyes, Jinx managed to spot Heatwave skirting the front of the blocked-in HIVE car and taking the cruiser. That rat bastard. She watched him with horror, starting forward only to be seized by a moment of intense dizziness. The ringing in her ears had only decreased slightly, she could still barely see and now she felt like she was going to throw up.

She pushed Trickster away when he tried to steady her. "Charlie," she said suddenly. "Oh-"

Trickster dragged a hand down his face. "In the-"

The rest of his sentence was lost in the squeal of tires as Heatwave made off with two more of Jinx's possessions- the cop car and the cop.

For a moment the Jinx and Trickster were of one mind, scrambling to the increasingly pathetic red vehicle. Jinx entered through the passenger door, not wanting to risk trying to pry open the ruined driver's door. She hurled herself over the console and into the seat, glass from a broken window crunching underneath her, and laid on the gas. Trickster just managed to close the door as they whipped past the stopped, confused drivers in the right lane, and gunned for their goal.

Traffic parted for both the cop car, and, consequentially, the HIVE car- Heatwave had figured out the sirens, and Jinx was following in his wake. She was starting to go through a panic attack.

Then, with a calming breath, she remembered that she was in Jump City. High-speed car chases just were not possible on most of the streets of Jump. Parking was friggin' impossible and sometimes it could take you a half hour just to crawl past a city block. Even with sirens, eventually you were going to come to the end of the line.

Sure enough, they ran into a blocked-up area filled with honking cars and swearing drivers. Heatwave jerked to a stop, blocked in, all lanes filled to the curbs.

"Stay!" Jinx snarled at Trickster, clambering over him and pressing him back into the seat. The last thing she needed was him running around when she had promised to watch him. "Find the key to Charlie's handcuffs. We'll need them."

Then she was off like a shot, streaking towards the dark figure that was Heatwave, already sprinting through the rows of stopped cars, carting his flamethrower, heedless when he accidentally hit something with it. Some of the drivers looked angry enough to get out of their cars and take out their road-rage on him, flamethrower or no flamethrower, but he was running too fast, so they just swore angrily to themselves and laid on their horns. Others watched Jinx blaze after the weird guy in a suit with the vague disinterest of Jump City locals, their thoughts of 'Eh, it's the city' meshing together like they were part of some kind of jaded, city-going Borg. Sure, some people got out of their cars, or shouted and pointed, but these were mostly tourists. Damn tourists.

Jinx was mostly unaware of any and all reactions around her, focused intently on the fleeing pyromaniac in front of her and gaining ground all the while. Heatwave was hampered by his heavy weapon, while Jinx was empowered by her years of training. She was nearly in range for a hex when he chanced a glance over his shoulder and balked at how close she was.

He turned, leveled his flamethrower and fired, and she dropped to the ground. She gathered her concentration and sent a hex flying at him. Her hands were scraped and bleeding and her side was searing where he had burned her before, and she ignored this to scramble to her feet and take off again- Heatwave had traipsed to the side and continued running down between a different row of cars. She was breathing hard, but she summoned a burst of strength to her protesting legs and went in for the kill.

He turned and raised his weapon to fire, but too late. She jumped with all her weight behind it and for a moment she thought she'd take him to the ground- but instead he just bit out a curse, the side-view mirror he was braced against digging into his back, and struck her a glancing blow to the head with the muzzle of his weapon.

She staggered back, stunned, and looked up just to see him raise his flamethrower to point at her yet again, and hear the shout of "DROP DOWN!" from behind her.

Easy enough. She let herself fall limply to the ground, a strange noise echoing behind and above her, followed by an agonized scream from Heatwave. She put her hands out at the last moment and fell into a crouch, glancing behind her- the cavalry. Charlie, rushing forward, handcuffs in hand, and Trickster, holding a giant… nose?

She glanced forward again, to see Heatwave's right arm and thigh covered in a strange… what _was _that? He had dropped his gun and was making a horrific amount of noise, scrabbling uselessly at the places where he'd been hit. Jinx glanced down at the pavement where some more of the strange goo had landed, and noticed that the concrete was smoking.

"What _is _that?" Jinx asked wonderingly, eyeing the gigantic nose in Trickster's hands, trying to slow her breathing.

"Snot-gun," said Trickster.

"Ah," said Jinx.

She rose to her feet and approached the panicked, pained Heatwave, who by now had fallen to the ground and was clutching at the raw places where the goo had touched him… it was probably some sort of acid. Charlie seemed hesitant to approach him, as Heatwave seemed to be in a large amount of pain and was moving spasmodically.

"Can't you do something?" he asked Trickster.

Trickster shrugged.

"I can," said Jinx. She moved forward, bent down, and held down Heatwave's head firmly against his curses and cries, one hand at his forehead. There was a pulse of pink light, and Heatwave stilled.

"I didn't mean like that," Charlie said dryly.

"_I _only knocked him unconscious. _Trickster_ got acid snot all over him." She straightened, paused, laughed hesitantly. "So, I don't suppose you'll let me have Heatwave?"

Charlie was fastening the handcuffs around Heatwave's wrists. Oh, sure, _now _he did something. "You ruined my car. Again."

Jinx waved an arm dismissively. "It was on its last legs, anyway. And you know full well that I _could _just knock you out _again _and _take _Heatwave." She smirked and crossed her arms. "But, I suppose I'll let you have all the credit for taking him in- he's wanted for arson, right?- _if _you'll conveniently mention that Trickster didn't do anything wrong. What do you say to that?"

Charlie leaned back on his haunches and looked up at her darkly. "I'd say you're a cheat and a liar, and that you'll find out whatever the police force manage to wrestle out of this guy, anyway."

Jinx smiled. "You're much too kind. Come on, Charlie. How could you condemn an innocent, pathetic face like this?" She grabbed Trickster by the collar, fixed his head so he was staring at Charlie, and gave him a little shake. "Look pathetic," she told Trickster.

Either Trickster succeeded in looking pathetic enough, or the cop had been through too much this evening. Either way, Charlie just rolled his eyes upwards, and Jinx knew she'd won.

She snagged Trickster's arm and started dragging him away. "Thanks, Charliepants! You can say whatever about me, not like I care. Just don't get Trickster into more trouble. Find a good mechanic, your squad car needs it."

Charlie just shook his head at the retreating teens. They skirted through the rows of cars and disappeared in the tide of people hurrying forward to gawk at the scene, all too eager to make the traffic today that much worse.

-------------------

'_You can say whatever about me.'_

"…wanted for arson, was apprehended last night by…"

Oh no.

"…assistance, here he is. Officer Charles, what do you have to say…"

Nooooo.

"…She just jumped into action cool as could be, had some weirdo friend with her, I doubt I could have subdued Heatwave on my own…"

'_Not like I care.'_

"Honestly, this didn't come as a shock…"

It was too horrible!

"… I've seen Jinx around before, and she didn't seem like a real villain…"

Why?!

"…just needed a bit of guidance. It's not surprising at all that she seems to have turned over a new leaf…"

'_You can say whatever about me. Not like I care.'_

What had she been _thinking, _saying something like that?! Now the words were reverberating around her skull, taunting her, replaying over and over as a sense of panic settled lightly, disturbingly over her.

Directly after the Heatwave incident, she had disguised the pants off of her and Trickster- literally- and watched Teenaged Mutant Ninja Turtles until she brought him back to the hospital sans Trickster-costume, strolling away nonchalantly afterwards, safe in her civilian identity.

Then she had gone home, changed into her nightclothes, and sat down to find this gem of a news flash on TV.

Charlie- that bastard- was smiling guilelessly into the camera and lying shamefacedly about how Jinx, a villain if there ever was one, had possibly turned over a new leaf and helped apprehend a criminal.

She should have just taken Heatwave and kept him in the bathroom. There were ways…

Oh, man. What was she going to do _now? _What if her _team _(ex-team, ex-team) saw this? What if-

No. She wasn't going to freak out about this. She was not.

Ignoring the fact that she was, in fact, mildly freaked-out, she decided that she would try to sketch for a while, and failed miserably. She found herself unable to concentrate, and after five minutes of increasingly nonsensical scribblings, she finally gave up, tore the latest sketchbook page into little pieces, and stuffed it down the garbage. Then, because she was possibly a masochist, she went back to the couch and started drawing again. Not like she could have gotten any sleep anyway.

What seemed like an eternity later, she looked at the clock. 3:10 a.m. She blinked, and the numbers blurred. Probably not a good sign. Sighing, she got up and went to find herself some caffeine.

By 4:34 a.m. she was losing it. The caffeine was wearing off, and she had no idea what she was supposed to do. She didn't even know how she had made it this far. But she still felt too wired and panicked to go to sleep. Oh man, oh man. What if- no, she would NOT worry about this.

Hm… She appeared to be drawing a manticore wearing pantaloons. This did not bode well.

By 4:55 she had moved on to an actually half-decent picture of a unicorn goring someone who looked suspiciously like Officer Charles Spencer on the end of its horn, and was about to keel over, when Wally walked in the front door, looking the worse for wear.

"Who threw you off a bridge?" asked Jinx, raising her nonexistent eyebrows. He didn't look roughed up, just… emotionally weary.

"I was just about to ask you the same thing," he replied good-naturedly, shuffling over. He collapsed on the couch next to her when she scooted over, and leaned his head back on an exhausted exhale.

Jinx tried to look completely absorbed in her drawing while still studying him out of the corner of her eye. She toyed with the pencil in her hand, wondering if she could surreptitiously sketch him. This was a good angle. His neck looked really- umm… uhhh… dumb and… hero-ish! Wow, speaking of heroes, she hoped he hadn't-

"I saw your news report," he said, a smile involuntarily curling his lips. "How's Trickster doing? He turn over a new leaf, too?"

His eyes were closed. If she took her sketchbook and just-

"Please don't hit me with anything," he said, eyes still closed. "Especially that sketchbook. I still haven't seen all your drawings."

Her grumblings told him that he had predicted her next move nicely. She put the sketchbook back down on her lap and bent over it, studying it, twirling her pencil in between her fingers. Wally just breathed deeply. They were both obviously exhausted.

"Trickster's back in the hospital, but they'll probably discharge him soon. He was fine when I left him there- well, he needed some pills without a doubt, but still, fine enough," she said suddenly. "And as to the news report, I was just watching after Trickster, as per our deal. I had no intentions of doing anything lawful at all, I promise you. Turning in Heatwave was a complete accident."

"Good to know," he said, and cracked an eyelid to watch the news. "Too bad you failed. Maybe you're a-"

Fatigue made her snap. "I didn't turn him in because I'm a good guy," she said in a fit of temper. "I turned him in because he had the nerve to jump me in an alley." She paused, realized what she had said without thinking, and felt her heart drop to her toes. She hadn't told him that, had she? Not that she owed it to him. Still, she didn't need him all huffy- Wally's expression hadn't changed, but who knew what he was thinking, and the last thing she wanted right now was him being nosy. "And because there wasn't enough room for him in your bathroom," she said quickly, trying to avoid silence. "So, what do-gooder business did you have to attend to that was so urgent?"

No one would have noticed that masterful change of subject.

For a moment she didn't think he'd answer. Then…

He mumbled something.

"What was that?" she asked.

"Went home," he sighed, and closed his eye again.

"Oh," she said, still toying with her pencil, deciding not to sketch him. It would only fuel his ego, so she would just have to tear up any drawings of him into little pieces so no one found out.. not that she'd done that before. She set the sketchbook aside, then remarked dryly, "I guess that didn't go well."

"Yeah. Wouldn't you know it, my parents don't like that I've disappeared in the middle of the school year."

She sat up straight, alarmed. "You didn't just di-"

"No," he interrupted. "My Uncle Barry's covering for me."

"Does he know?"

"Yeah." He smiled again, this one less weary. "He's great. You should meet him someday. I'm still running out of absent days, of course, but it's not like that hasn't happened before. Thanks for your concern, though."

Her brow crinkled. "I'm not-"

"Oh, I'm sure." He stood, and his hand flashed out faster than her eye could follow, brushed her temple. "Got a bruise there," he said to her absently, and picked up her hands.

"What are you _doing_?" she asked as if it was the most affronting thing in the world, which, to her, it probably was.

"Oh, you know, implanting a tracking chip in your hand in case you kidnap me and take me away to your secret lair." He inspected her palms, raw from hitting asphalt.

Jinx looked unaffected to the best of her ability. Her pulse ignored this valiant attempt, already faltering like someone falling over their own feet. Only more pleasant. And more treasonous. "A nice thought, except I've had enough of trying to hold you hostage to last me a lifetime."

"Oh really?" He waggled his eyebrows at her. She was about to laugh, hit him and call him a dork when he leaned forward and murmured, "You sure about that? I vibrate, you know."

His hands buzzed against hers, and, taken completely by surprise, she jerked them away. She was sure she was open-mouthed with shock, staring like an idiot, and she felt her face getting warm. Jinx rarely, if ever, blushed, but she supposed now was a special occasion. Her pulse, meanwhile, had kicked into a canter and was stumbling around like a happy drunk. She could hear it pounding away in her ears. Wally turned to go into his bedroom, laughing, and something in his eyes said _gotcha. _

She was left sitting on the couch, flushed and floored, trying to rub the tingling feeling from her hands. Well. _Well._ What could she even _say _to that?! _Just… don't… think about it…_ There was _nothing-_that- rather, there was, but nothing that-

Well, there was nothing to say to that if she was okay with accepting defeat.

Which she wasn't. Ever.

Which was why she stood up and tugged him to a stop. Wally looked to the side and then jerked his head back to the front at seeing her nearly resting her chin on his shoulder. He had a vague inkling of, _oh crap this is revenge_, before he felt her hand brush his shoulderblade, and the thought quite happily abandoned him. Her hand slid to the small of his back, and even though Jinx told herself this was just a contest, she couldn't help but enjoy more than just putting Wally off-balance. The guy could run to Paris and come back with a croissant in less than a second. He was pure corded, compact muscle and he had a really nice back and she got to touch and mmmm. Biting back a happy sigh, her hand drifted lower, lower... Wally's brain stalled and then died.

Her hand just brushed the top of his jeans, and then she pulled back abruptly, leaving him confused and cold.

"Shame you don't carry that wallet everywhere," she said, smirking at the back of his head.

She might have had gray skin, but her blushes had nothing on the good old-fashioned flush of bright red on a readhead. She couldn't see his face from here, but she could see it creeping up from the edges of his ears.

What in the world was she doing? Winning, that's what.

She gave a genuine laugh. Might as well be honest. "Nice ass, West," she said, still laughing.

Well, whaddya know. She _could _make him blush clear to the tips of his ears. Smirking the most self-satisfied smirk she'd worn since she first contacted the Brotherhood of Evil, Jinx turned and proceeded to make herself comfortable on the couch as if she had not just completely felt up her roommate.

That footage of Charlie was on again. "…seems to have turned over a new leaf…"

Somehow it didn't quite bother her as much anymore. She shut the TV off, cool as you please, and, as Wally was slinking off to bed, soundly defeated, closed her eyes quite contentedly. It was only as she was drifting off to sleep, her hands and face still unusually warm, that she realized she had forgotten to collect on her end of the deal.


	10. Taking Advantage

A/N: I apologize for losing interest so thoroughly in writing this- I just don't know where I originally intended to go with this plot-wise, but at this point I should just crank out some damn chapters.

I again want to thank anyone who has reviewed or favorited or read this bit of nonsense. It's really gratifying. I put some angry, combative cuddles (best kind) at the end for you all. Plus, VIBRATING KID FLASH (more on this in later chapters). For the love of god (the god of kink) he can vibrate why has _no one _taken advantage of this? I do it because someone needs to! More people need to take advantage of the fact that the dude can vibrate his molecules! Spread the word!

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Jinx was never really in control of her team.

She was intelligent. She had the potential to be a good leader. She had plans. She had dignity.

She had a mean right hook and no compunctions about using it.

So how, _how on Earth_ did a stupid boy with too much hair gel manage to hold together a seemingly invincible team when she couldn't even get her own to stop drinking the milk when it was past its expiration date? _How _did Robin lead despite the fact that he wore _shiny green pants? _How could they respect him?! It just defied every fundamental law Jinx had set up in her head.

Yet there was no denying the Titans' far superior teamwork. They were damn well flawless. And if she had ever thought they could be torn apart, Cyborg had disabused her of that notion quite thoroughly, thank you very much.

And for all that first-hand experience with them, Jinx could not for the life of her define what made them a team, and what made the Five just a couple of kids just trying to score some free swag with whoever was handy. It was probably something between the Titans' friendship and their loyalty to each other and their dedication to a similar cause, but she doubted the Five could pull off whatever it was even if she _did _know.

That didn't stop her from wanting to know. She had often spent large amounts of her free time going over and over battles and behavior and books on teamwork she'd read back at the Academy, verging on understanding (or just thinking she was) but never quite finding out the Titans' secret. She would wear herself out emotionally searching for the answer and then be physically drained as well the next day, with a sweet, sick feeling in her gut.

That same feeling made itself known when Jinx woke up at seven in the morning, two hours after she had drifted off. It persisted as she tossed and turned for the next hour, that same sickly-sweet worry that made her feel physically weak. She was an idiot and she was tired and she was in deep shit. Save the team that never followed anyone from the imaginary group of villains that tore up their base that was already half-ruined by Kid Flash, then just run away from Jump City. Marvelous plan. Marvelous, marvelous, marvelous plan by the girl with no brain.

"Wally?" she called, her voice only slightly panicked, as she pounded down his door at eight in the morning. She wasn't going to be able to fall asleep, even though she felt exhausted. It probably wouldn't be a good idea, either- her powers had been leaking again while she slept, and that hadn't happened since she enrolled in the Academy. The knitted blanket she had been under was now half knotted and half unraveled, individual fibers falling apart in some places. She was hoping this was just a temporary relapse due to high levels of stress. If it wasn't, she would leave Wally's apartment immediately. Heaven forbid she hurt the Titans' speedy golden boy.

But it had to be just stress. She would never go back to those hellish days before the Academy again- because even people could unravel and it was a lot messier than what happened to blankets. A lot harder to clean out of the carpet and from under your nails. Ugh.

Bam. Bam. Bam. "Wally? Are you-" the door swung open under her fist. The room was empty.

_Damn it!_ He was supposed to be there, so she could collect on her end of the deal. That card belonged to whatever organization Heatwave belonged to, if he did belong to one. Whoever they were, they thought she had the cat's eye necklace, which they wanted, apparently. Chances were it was another enemy of theirs had taken it- that, or an enemy of hers.

The reality of that destroyed blanket was seeping in slowly but surely. She felt a sudden, intense need to follow through with her plan, as feeble as it was- except that she wanted to find who had stolen the pendant not simply to shut up Heatwave's organization, but for her own personal gain. To do so, however, she'd have to get information from her only lead- Heatwave. She was going to need to do all the research she could and then go to work until seven, since she'd need cash in case she needed to do a quick disappearing act. Her boss just couldn't get her mind around Jinx's insistence on staying there all day instead of working shifts like a normal person, and if Jinx was going to be banned from work for the morning for her health, she was damned well going to use that time to kick some ass.

But first, she needed to shower. It was probably good that Wally wasn't here. She needed time to regroup. She hadn't been meditating lately, and hadn't done so in ages, since her early academy days when that was the first technique they taught her to control her powers. They soon moved her to different techniques, and she had been controlling her powers through discipline and sheer willpower ever since, but such a drastic breech in her control- not that there hadn't been others- made her consider taking the habit up again.

For now, though, she'd just use more mundane methods of relaxation. Grabbing her bag, Jinx paused to give their sleeping hedgehog a pat on the head, then slouched into the bathroom. She felt really crummy all of a sudden, and no wonder- rolling around on asphalt the other day hadn't done her any favors.

She tossed her clothes into a corner, stepped into the shower and released a jet of freezing cold water on herself. She shied away from the water and did the pansy 'how little of myself can I get wet while still turning up the water temperature' thing. The water warmed marginally and she stepped into it and leaned her head against the wall. As the cool tile pressed against her forehead and water streamed down her back to drum on the shower floor, she worked to regulate her breathing and just relax. She then made a half-assed attempt at cleaning herself, choosing the mild-smelling girly bath-soaps and shampoos for today, and then just stood under the water. Her burn was mostly healed, she noted absently. It was just settling into the slightly mottled pattern of a burn scar.

After a moment of hesitation, she grabbed the bar of soap off the side of the tub that Wally used, held it to her face and inhaled deeply. The scent immediately calmed her more than anything else she'd done all morning. She finally felt put-together enough to let her thoughts wander.

To be honest, she didn't feel as guilty about the HIVE Five's trashed base anymore. She had been swallowed up in rage and possessiveness towards a group of boys who were never truly hers, is she was brutally honest, and she had made dramatic promises she didn't feel so enthusiastic about anymore. She would subdue Heatwave's group, if he had one, but it wasn't quite for the same reasons anymore.

If anything, it was for the fact that she couldn't leave Jump City until this was resolved. She knew how obsessive heroes and villains alike could be, and just because she could move on from Jump City didn't mean it would move on from her.

Of course, she still didn't know what side of the law she was on. Mentally, she was straddling a fence that separated the two. That was okay for now, but she knew in some confident part of her that somewhere in this mess, the cat's eye necklace would end up in her hands. And then she'd have some choices to make. For a while there she felt like she would be able to give it back to the museum regardless of personal interest, but after this morning's lack of control, she wasn't so sure. There were compelling reasons she wanted to rid herself of the powers that she very rarely took pride in. Of course, this was assuming that the necklace did have any ability to negate her bad luck.

Even if it was just metal, and it became easy to let the necklace go, she'd have to start making moral decisions sooner or later. She was straddling the fence between the law and the lawless now, but soon she'd have to pick a damn side before her ass got sore.

Jesus, what had her metaphors come to. Jinx cut off the water and stepped out of the shower feeling like she'd cleared her mind a bit. She was slightly calmer, but certainly not happier.

That was what came from long stretches of thinking about herself. Jinx had been told once that if you reflected on your own problems you would just become depressed, and that the best way to get over your own issues was sometimes to stop focusing on them and to pay attention to the problems of those around you.

It was certainly a less depressing prospect than focusing on her own problems. She'd only managed to bungle things with the HIVE Five, and what did Wally need from her? Sure he wanted to help her, it was in his nature, but she was sure he had to regret his actions at least a little by now. She'd barged into his life and his Jump City home and made a mess of things and what was worse, she had groped him yesterday. _Twice._

Not that he didn't deserve it, really.

Still mulling things over, Jinx finished tossing on a shirt and jeans. She grabbed her bag, opened the door and-

Too much yellow! Too much red! Gaaaah!

"JINX! You're done! Man, I thought you'd be in there-"

"AAAaa… wha…?"

"-_forever_ I- oh, did I scare you? Sorry! Anyway, it's so great, I-"

"Whoa… slow down… I need to…" She knew that 'slow down' wasn't going to register in his little monkey brain, but she tried it anyway. He just ushered her out of the bathroom, tossed her bag aside, ignoring her indignant look, and jumped around, being overly secretive about whatever he had behind his back. She wanted to bring up the subject of the card she'd asked him to investigate right away so she could leave and get some work of the non-civilian kind done, but she couldn't just interject now. He was like an overexcited puppy. She couldn't just kick him. (He was moving around too much. Couldn't get a good shot in.)

"Aw, Jinx, you look a little down. But I have something to cheer you up! I don't know why we didn't get it sooner, it's so much more practical."

She stared at him with a bemused expression as he grinned at her earnestly. A smile was already fighting to curve into existence on her face and her worries had all but evaporated. She couldn't believe that just a half hour earlier she had seriously considered distancing herself from Kid Flash because of her powers. She worried about hurting people on accident (on purpose was entirely different) on a regular basis but for some reason, when he was around, she felt invincible. Maybe it was that inexhaustible optimism.

"Okay, okay, get ready. Close your eyes." He flashed another of his wholehearted grins at her. He was practically wiggling with excitement. Thank god he didn't have a tail- he'd have knocked over a lamp by now.

_Man, what's got him so hyper? Well, more hyper than usual. _"What? No! Just let me see it." She reached out, but he immediately danced out of her reach like it was a game.

"You can't see it until you close your eyes!" he retorted childishly.

"Fine, whatever," she muttered, closing her eyes and mumbling about how dumb this was. She felt pretty stupid, but kind of amused at the same time. She fought to hold in laughter.

"Okay, okay. Okay okay okay. I'm holding it out now. You can open your eyes on the count of three. One… Two… Two and a half…"

"This is so dumb." She opened her eyes.

"Ah! You totally cheated! That was only two and a half!" He whipped the box in his hands out of her view before she could figure out what it was.

"Oh come on, I closed my eyes, let me see it!" She was indignant now for a completely different reason. His energy was infectious.

Insult of insults, he stuck his tongue out at her. "Nope! You cheated. Cheaters don't get gifts."

Her mouth dropped open in outrage. Too far. Now he was going to get it. "You'd better give me my present."

"What're you gonna-"

He didn't manage to say anything else before she tackled him to the ground. She felt an immediate feeling of mild shame, but brushed it off. He had hyped it up, dammit, she wanted to see what it was!

Jinx wrenched the box out of his grasp and bounced back to her feet, making a tactical retreat to the couch as she did so. "Mwa ha ha ha! Foolish Kid Flash, I have obtained the… colored contacts? Oh thank god I'll never have to wear sunglasses again."

Kid Flash didn't stir from where he'd hit the floor, trying his best to look grievously injured. "Oh God, you've killed me! I'm dying. I'm dying. Everything's so cold."

Jinx rolled her eyes so severely she was sure she sprained something. "Okay, drama queen. Did you dent your prom tiara?"

Kid Flash groaned, eyes squinting against the imaginary pain of his death throes. "Stay gold, Ponyboy, stay gold…"

Jinx ripped the top off the box and tossed it at Kid Flash's prone form, making a sour face at him. "You are such a dork! I cannot believe this is what you were so excited about."

He cracked an eye open and pouted. "If you don't want them I can just-"

"No! They're mine!" Jinx clutched the box protectively. "Now I just need-"

A rush of air, and Kid Flash was standing in front of her, holding out a bottle of contact solution. He watched her intently as she grabbed it.

"Don't do that, you're making me nervous! I've never used contacts before, I don't know how to put them on." Jinx tore the plastic off the bottle of contact solution, averting her eyes.

"Oh, really? I'll help you-"

"And what would you know? I bet you have perfect vision. You just want to try them on for yourself!"

"I always wanted brown eyes…"

"Get your own!"

Five minutes of bickering and a trip to the bathroom later, and Jinx was staring, transfixed, at the pair of completely normal eyes in the mirror. They were dark brown and wholly mundane- the only thing that made them unusual was the fact that they were staring out of her face.

A pair of blue eyes peeked over her shoulder. The only thing that made them unusual was the fact that they were staring out of the face of a superhero. "I like your normal eyes better," said Kid Flash. He contemplated resting his chin on her shoulder but decided that was pushing it.

She reached over her shoulder and flicked him on the nose, not even bothering to bring up the fact that her 'normal' eyes weren't exactly, well… normal. "God, you're weird."

"I want to check something out, though. Come here for a sec." He grabbed her wrist, other hand gingerly rubbing his nose, and dragged her over to the window, positioning her so that the morning sun shined directly into her eyes. Then he covered her eyes with a hand (she hoped absently that it wasn't the hand he'd just been fondling his nose with). She had no idea what he was about. After a few moments, he removed the hand and stared directly at her.

She balked slightly at his close scrutiny and furrowed (where) her eyebrows (would be if she had them) at him. She would have moved back a step but he was holding her still by her upper arms.

"Hmm," he said. "Thought so. When your pupils contract, a little bit of pink shows through on the sides of your pupil. Are they cutting off your vision?"

She grumbled a bit. "Yeah. Easy for _you _to like my 'normal' eyes when you don't have to deal with them." She'd heard that colored contacts cut off even the vision of people who were blessed with normally shaped pupils - but it wasn't as bad as if the contacts had been opaque (because of her light eye color, that wasn't necessary). But on the other hand those sunglasses had been getting annoying, and they were broken now. "Thanks, though, I'm glad you got these- it may just be paranoia but I think it'd be too obvious if I went out and bought 'em."

"No problem," he said offhandedly (Mentally, he made five clones of himself and danced for joy times five). When she would have moved away, he tightened his grip on her arms and leaned forward, squinting at her. "You look really tired. How much sleep did you get?"

She balked a bit more, eyes wide and invisible eyebrows pulling downwards, but refused to look down. "Not enough," she said.

He frowned at her. "How about you go back to sleep? Sam told me she was banning you from work for the morning. You're not due in until seven in the evening."

"I can't. Listen, I need to collect on our deal, that card-"

"Yeah, _ooorr_, you could go to sleep and I can find out what you need to know rather than just giving you a name and letting you do all the work," he said.

She remained silent, and, sensing weakness, he raised his eyebrows imploringly and pitched his voice to a near-wheedle. "I'll be gone, so you can have the bed… Think of the warm covers… the comfy pillows… They're calling to you, Jinx…"

At any lesser point of exhaustion she would point-blank refuse the bed. But she was really, really-

"Can't you hear them?" he asked. "Jiiiiinx… Jinx, sleeeeeep on uuusss… We're sooooo comfyyyy… Jiiiiiinx…."

"Oh, fine," she said after a few minutes of just standing there vacantly, drifting off, as Kid Flash watched with a somewhat worried expression and pretended to be his sheets.

"I knew you'd give in," he said, smirking as he put an arm around her shoulders and steered her away from the window.

She automatically relaxed against him, all but slumping to the floor. She was a lot more exhausted than she realized, and she had figured she was pretty damn exhausted. "I ruined your blanket," she mumbled, halfway asleep already.

"Oh?" he paused to move her bag over to the side of the couch, sparing a look for the half-knotted, half-unraveled blanket. "It must have done something very terrible to deserve that."

"Nnh. It was an accident. Leaking…" she rubbed at her face wearily, "leaking bad luck. Hasn't happened since before the Academy."

"Did that happen a lot? Before, I mean?" He had taken her shoulders and was leading her towards the bed again, but she was barely paying attention to her clumsy steps.

"Mmmhm. Before the Academy," she said. "Sucked. Bad things happen when I'm not controlling the luck properly."

He was sitting her down on the bed, and sat down next to her. "You know, Robin could help you with that. The Titans could. They'll teach you to control your power. I'm not pressuring you, and you shouldn't join just for that, but keep it in mind."

"Thought I _had _it under relative control. Guess not." She shuddered slightly and then flopped down onto the bed.

She sensed that Kid Flash was hesitating, and she cut in regardless of whatever he was going to say. She was so tired. "Don't want to talk about it," she said into the covers.

"Okay." His hands blurred, and the covers were out from under her and tucked around her shoulders. "Get some sleep, and don't worry about the luck thing. You were tired out when you fell asleep, and you were fighting Heatwave, and I bet you kept yourself up worrying anyway. It won't happen again."

When he sounded so reasonable she completely believed him. "If you say so" somehow translated to her mouth as "Mhhhh," and her eyes slid closed.

"Don't go to sleep yet. You should take the contacts off," he urged, holding forth a contact case from seemingly nowhere.

She struggled up and complied, barely finding the strength to remove them clumsily before flopping back down. Her hand idly placed the case on Wally's bedside table. "G'night," she said, even though it was morning.

"Night, Jinx," he replied, and a gust of wind heralded his departure.

She opened her eyes slightly to make sure he was really gone, and then she shimmied out of her jeans and bra and tossed them over the side of the bed. They were way too uncomfortable, there was no way she was sleeping in them. As she buried her face in his pillow and burrowed into his blankets she inhaled unashamedly and sighed. _That's better,_ she thought to herself as she drifted off again.

She didn't wake up again until noon. Her body felt warm and heavy, and she glanced at the clock and checked the comforter for any signs of decay due to her powers before closing her eyes again.

At three, she was roused by some instinct that told her she wasn't alone. She cracked an eye and peered over the edge of the bed. A set of feet encased in bright red were standing there, trying not to fidget and doing a really crap job of it. Attached to the feet was Kid Flash.

"Oh finally, you're awake. I'm so bored and I thought you'd never get up." Kid Flash was obnoxiously cheery and awake, as usual.

Her neural pathways were clogged with brain syrup. A sluggish thought dragged its lard-ass across her mind. "…How long were you standing there?"

"Like, two seconds, but I thought I was going to have to wait years. It's three in the afternoon, you bum."

She sat up slowly, moving as if she was underwater. "_You_ said I should sleep," she mumbled. She ran a hand through her hair blearily and then stretched her arms high above her head, joints cracking.

Kid Flash tried, he really _tried _(he tried _a lot, _he almost hurt himself from trying so much) to look away when her shirt rode up a bit, but you couldn't blame his eyes for being drawn to the strip of stomach-

All of a sudden his blood ran cold and his jaw clenched as he glimpsed the healing remains of her burn wound. Jinx had mentioned something about Heatwave attacking her, some kind of conflict that had taken place before her running around with Trickster, and he had been meaning to ask her about it, but he hadn't thought-

She noticed the direction of his gaze and hurriedly tugged at her shirt, and the blankets, but in a blur of speed he tugged the covers down and lifted her shirt to her bellybutton as he looked at the burn, horrified.

Jinx's eyes widened and mortification washed over her in a wave. She wasn't wearing pants! Her chastity! Waahh! …At least she was wearing her favorite pair of underwear.

The injury looked fresh… "Where did you get this?" he demanded, voice harsh.

His sharp command shocked her into an automatic response. "V-Victoria's Secret," she squeaked.

His eyes dropped and silence reigned for several moments before he jumped back as if burned and spun around. "Uhmmmm," he said. "Yeah, I was talking about the wound."

"Oh. Oh!" Well. _Well. _"Oh, uh, Heatwave."

"I know. Er, I mean, I don't _know, _I just kind of… figured. Not many people, ah…"

"Carry around gigantic flamethrowers," she finished, laughing nervously.

He glanced at her over his shoulder, and she tugged the blankets back up. He turned around again, ears turning red, and scratched at the back of his neck. "So you got that when he-?"

"Yeah. Jumped me. Alley. Cheap shot."

"Ah. Well, I'm going to, uh, go." He'd already started slowly edging towards the door.

"O-ok." She wondered if she would ever be able to look him in the face again.

"Ok. Bye."

"Bye."

Sometimes even superspeed wasn't a fast enough exit.

The door shut quietly behind Kid Flash. Left in the silence of his departure, Jinx contemplated this tragedy with disbelief. Normally, her plan of action in a situation such as this was violence, but she hadn't been quite that quick on the uptake this morning, and for good reason. Well, it was over. Nothing to do but act normal and _force the last few minutes of her life to disappear by sheer force of will._

"Where were you when I needed you?" she muttered darkly to her pants as she pulled them on, feeling betrayed.

Pointedly dressed, Jinx strode out of the bedroom combing her hair with her hands, looking completely unruffled. She locked eyes with Kid Flash on the couch, and silently willed him to realize that as far as she was concerned, they had gone back in a time machine and redone the scene in the bedroom.

Kid Flash got enough of the message, apparently, because he cleared his throat and gestured to a tray set up on the coffee table. On the tray was an assortment of croissants and sliced french bread flanked by butter. "I sorta got hungry today and ate everything in the apartment, so I brought you breakfast from this really great little bakery in Paris. It's owned by this pair of adorable French grannies, and their bread is delicious, especially warm. You were asleep though, so it cooled a bit. And I ate some." He grinned sheepishly.

"Oh no! My _fresh bread _from _France _has gone cold, how will I go _on_?" She covered the 'o' of her mouth with a hand as she strode over and somehow managed to sit down sarcastically. She took a bite of croissant, closed her eyes in pleasure, and then went on in a prim tone, "I will have you know that this is _unacceptable_, Williamsworth. You know very well I will have only _warm bread_ in the morning. As punishment for your grievous error-"

"Alright, alright. I'll take that as a 'thank you very much for breakfast.'" He stuck his tongue out at her snicker, disappeared into his room for a moment, and reappeared almost instantly dressed in civilian clothes.

He returned to his place on the couch, and Jinx ate croissants and savored the morning's- err, afternoon's- relative quiet (there were horns blaring outside somewhere, but that was normal). She could see Wally start to fidget in the corner of her vision and knew it was only a matter of time before his inability to sit still got the best of him.

She swallowed a mouthful of croissant and asked "So where do you keep your costume?" to keep him occupied.

For a moment she thought she had overstepped the line. She knew enough of his secrets already, she berated herself, but Wally's eyes brightened and he reached out to drop a gold ring into her hand.

Jinx narrowed her eyes and tilted her head down at the ring resting against her palm. Wiping the other hand free of crumbs on her jeans (oh-so-civilized), she picked it up and turned it in the light, examining it from all angles. The only place she could imagine the costume being was underneath the lightning insignia on the top (subtle), but the circular area on which the raised pattern was placed was thinner than a quarter of an inch. No way. He had to be messing with her.

When she turned her inquisitive look on him, he just put his feet up on the coffee table and crossed his hands behind his head. _Figure it out, _said his body language.

She attempted to do so while munching absently on her breakfast. There had to be some kind of release mechanism…

Ten minutes of intense battle with the ring later and it had failed to reveal its secrets, although Jinx and Wally had managed to decimate the croissants. Jinx was frustrated with herself- she'd tinkered with enough of Gizmo's inventions to consider herself a mild expert at figuring out little release triggers.

Wally seemed amused enough watching her try to figure it out. Finally he reached over and made as if to take it, but she batted his hands away and slipped the ring on. She would prevail!

She made another pass of the sides of the crown of the ring upon which the lightning insignia rested, lightly using her nails to search for a seam. There seemed to be one, and- was that a set of grooves on either side? She slipped her nails into the depressions and half a cry of triumph escaped her lips before Wally's suit exploded out of the ring, turning her cry of triumph into a cry of shock. She hadn't _really _thought his suit was going to come springing out of that tiny ring.

Wally, of course, began laughing uproariously, so she threw the suit at him.

"Your _face,_" said the monster under the uniform, words accompanied by sporadic laughter.

"Hilarious," she said.

He pulled the eye-blinding mass of red and yellow off himself, in the process managing somehow to make his hair look messier than it looked following one of his sessions of running around at mach 5. "Yeah, what's really hilarious is trying to get it back _into _the ring." His eyes crinkled at her muffled snort of amusement. "I'd tell you how it works, but I think I've revealed enough of my deepest darkest secrets for today."

He had been expecting a responding smile at least, but was met with a shift in the way Jinx sat and her suddenly averted eyes. He winced.

"If your mentor ever finds out about me, he'll kill you." Jinx frowned into the middle distance. Moodily.

"What, the Flash? Nah. Phase me halfway through a wall and leave me there, maybe. And then bring my dad in to lecture me while I'm trapped."

"Is he that bad? Your dad, I mean."

"Well, let's just say we don't quite see eye to eye. Not to mention he's _really _pissed at me right now. I'd say I'm about… three quarters of the way through the legal process of being disowned at this point, at least in his head."

The prospect of finding out what terrible things Wally must have done to annoy his father was cheering Jinx slightly.

"So… What did you do?" As usual, her intents to stay clear of Wally somehow ended up with her asking him intimate personal details about his life. How did that keep happening??

"_Do? _You just _assume _I did something? Maybe he is just bad-tempered and I am the poor, innocent victim of-"

"Please. Don't look me in the eye and say you are completely innocent when I am _seconds_ away from digging up some dirt on the most angelic, heroic, gold-hearted do-gooder of the damn century."

She meant it as the gravest of insults, but Wally looked mildly surprised at her words, and whatever he was about to say came out as a soft, happy hum. He proceeded to watch her out of the corner of his eyes, smiling in a slightly embarrassed but undeniably pleased manner. Jinx had more than half a mind to wipe the goofy smile off his face but oh, he was pathetic. It was best to let it go- after all, she did think those things, even if they were negative traits in her estimation.

…Furthermore, why not take advantage of this? If he wanted to sit around and be flattered, that was his business… That thought in mind, Jinx scooted slightly closer to Wally, who was now scratching the back of his neck and averting his eyes.

"Seriously, though…" Having gained his attention, Jinx leaned in slightly, expression open and imploring. "Why don't you tell me? I mean, I know I… definitely know too much already…" She inserted an abashed laugh here, and bit her lip, seemingly feeling guilty, "but it would make me feel better knowing that you're a hero and still, well… not perfect."

Wally swallowed shakily. He had been startled to find her suddenly invading his personal space, and her nearness was shepherding him firmly away from rational thought. He could already feel his will weakening… it was another one of those situations where he knew he was playing into her hands, but couldn't help himself. Her words, however, seemed to instill some sense into him, and he smacked his palm against her forehead, face deadpan. "Nope! Not gonna fall for that one."

Over her shock in a second, she brought a hand to her forehead, soothing its wounded pride. "Damn! I almost had you… Alright… We'll bargain for it. No? How about a card game? I'm good at those-"

"Geez, do you really want to know that bad?" He was back to rubbing his neck again.

"_Yes! _I want to know _so bad!" _She laughed at her own eagerness. This information was too valuable for pride.

He sighed and relented. If she really wanted to know, she'd get it out of him eventually. He had almost spilled two seconds before. Might as well just cut his losses. "Fine…" His back straightened and he began to examine his nails daintily, affecting a debonair tone. "I have entered a momentary state of suspended animation regarding the prestigious facility of my academics."

"Meaning…?"

"Suspended animation meaning I am _suspended._"

Blank, pink stare. Followed by an almost offensively excited "Really? _You? Suspended? _You… are kidding me. No way! No _way!_"

"It's not that unbe-…"

"Ahaha oh my GOD you have GOT to be kidding me!" When no 'just kidding' seemed to be in sight, Jinx slowly came around to the idea that he was, indeed, telling the truth. She came around to this idea by laughing in disbelief.

"You already said…"

"No, no, don't even talk to me! That is ridiculous! I refuse to believe that." She laughed some more, helplessly, and wiped a few tears away from the corners of her eyes. "Look at me, I'm crying. Look what you did. Oh, man."

His resigned look had settled into 'mildly offended.' "Are you done now?"

"No! I am so far from done! How did you get suspended? How on earth did the golden boy get suspended?" At this rate she was going to turn into an insatiable gossip, but _she had to know. _Her mind was already working at breakneck pace to puzzle out how circumstances could possibly have led Wally West to be suspended from school like… like some kind of delinquent! "You were framed, right? You had to be framed. Or it's one of those lame little suspensions that you get for doing stupid stuff, the two-day ones."

"No, I was not framed. It is a longer suspension than that, let me assure you. And _that _is the end of how much I'm going to tell you." Wally sat back and crossed his arms. Case closed.

Jinx turned to face him, kneeling eagerly on the couch. Case not closed. "You can't just leave me hanging like that!" she said, past the point of subtlety.

"Oh, but I can," he said, also past the point of subtlety. He even had the nerve to smirk at her.

She was dealing more with the smartass, impertinent Kid Flash side of him now, so there was no way she was going to pull him in with another bit of acting, especially after her last performance fell flat. This left intimidation, her favorite!

"If you want me to hex you into an unconscious stupor, sure, you can," she said, eyes mocking him condescendingly.

He laughed outright and forgot his intention to not antagonize her… too much. Instead he launched headlong into the confrontation, leaning forward and lording his height advantage over her, noses inches away. "Frankly, if all I'm up against are a few pink fireworks, I'll take my chances."

Which was how he found himself flat on his back yet again, Jinx pinning his wrists to either side of his head. Honestly, how did she keep pulling these tackles off? He could watch them happen in slow-mo, sure, but it was ridiculous how effortlessly the motions seemed to come to her- she must have practiced incessantly at the HIVE for her physical retaliation to be this reflexive.

Unfortunately, no amount of practice would help her prevail against his speed. Faster than her eyes could move, Jinx's wrists were firmly within Wally's grip. Wally pressed her backwards, forcing her to rear back slightly, and her hands sparked in reaction to her spike in temper.

"Ow!" Wally winced as one of the stray pink sparks flared against his skin. A moment later, Wally's hands were gone, leaving Jinx to fall against his chest. She tucked her powers away again as her blood ran hot and cold. Okay, no more using her powers for petty fights when she was as out of control as she had been lately- someone only got hurt… usually Kid Flash.

Just as she braced her hands against him to push herself up and opened her mouth to apologize, her speedster opponent decided that if she was going to use her powers, fine. Turnabout was fair play. So he slid one arm around her back, holding her against him, and settled the other one likewise with his hand resting comfortably on the nape of her neck, and sent a wave of vibration down his body, from his fingertips to his toes.

Jinx wasn't sure what she had been expecting when he looked down at her with that wild edge to his smile, but it certainly wasn't _that._ Disoriented and pressed against someone she wasn't sure anymore she should provoke, she had been forced to lie still as his hands _hummed _against her, goosebumps rising in response along her arms. _"I vibrate, you know," _replayed mockingly in her head as that same unendurable hum traveled down his body and, as a result, down every inch of hers, reverberating in her bones.

She was sure it had only been a few seconds, but it felt like much longer. When his legs stopped buzzing against her enticingly, she immediately tried to push herself up again. He let her get just high enough on her shaky arms to let him drink in her shell-shocked expression.

Jinx, who had never been one to blush, felt her face suffused in heat. Her limbs were trembling shamefully (traitors), her heartbeat was hammering in her ears and she was curiously short of breath. None of these symptoms measured up to the shock that raced up her spine when she locked eyes with Kid Flash.

His expression was as intense as she'd ever seen it, and the last of her bravado fled in the face of his eyes, darker and somehow sharper than usual. His head was tilted, and he was watching her with a look of consideration. The twist to his lips said that he knew _exactly _what he was doing to her, and the edge to his expression said he was still acutely interested in how she would react.

She shivered, once.

Instantly, he broke the spell, eyes lightening and hands suddenly righting her and setting her gently on the couch. Jinx was grudgingly grateful for the help, and did her best to quell the slight tremor still thrumming through her. Kid Flash, on the other hand, bounced up as if nothing had happened (Jinx wasn't sure if she felt insulted or relieved- oh wait no, that was definitely relief, no uncertainty there), and held his hand out to her.

She narrowed her eyes, confused- the proverbial fish offered a bicycle. A flying bicycle.

"So, I guess we should go track down Heatwave's cronies?" he supplied.

She grabbed his hand with a bit more force than necessary, and a lot more force than someone recently recovering from what Jinx privately thought was a stroke should be able to exert, and pulled herself up. "What do you mean_ we?_"

And thus round two began.


End file.
